


Something About Volcanoes

by betts



Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Aggressive Snuggling, Alternate Universe - Hawaii, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Office, Angst, Ben Solo Is A Mama's Boy, Coworkers to lovers, Crack Treated Seriously, Fake/Pretend Relationship, Flimsy Character Motivation, Friends to Lovers, Graphic Depictions of Kylo Ren's Enormous Muscular Body, Gratuitous Application of Sunscreen, Holding Hands, Humor, Hux Is A Smol Anxious, Jealousy, M/M, Misunderstandings, Mutual Pining, No One Is In Character & Everything Hurts, Non-Consensual Manhandling, Romantic Comedy, Self-deprecating humor, Sharing a Bed, Surfing, TPS Reports, Weddings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-24
Updated: 2016-05-22
Packaged: 2018-06-02 15:09:01
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 27,944
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6570964
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/betts/pseuds/betts
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Think about it.” Hux makes a grandiose, sweeping motion with his arm. “The drama. The chaos. The rumors. The only thing better than a destination wedding is a heartwarming coming-out story to take the spotlight away from your selfish loved ones and their horrid pursuit of emotional fulfillment. Then you wait a few months, and announce it was all just a phase and you’re in fact happily engaged to...I don’t know, one of those body pillow things.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into 中文 available: [活火山 | Something About Volcanoes (Chinese translation)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/7820164) by [MrFrame](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MrFrame/pseuds/MrFrame)



> "This fic is like decaf Kylux: all of the sugar, less of the sin." —[Heather](http://www.experimintal.tumblr.com)

“Mom, I—” Ben says, a harsh whisper into his headset. Hux attempts not to eavesdrop, but it’s difficult when the spreadsheet in front of him is filled with tedium, and the conversation behind him is bound to be interesting.

“I know,” Ben continues. “Just—okay, yeah. Whatever.” A pause. “Fine, sure, registered at Macy’s, got it. See you later.” Another pause, now quieter: “I love you too. Bye.”

Ben’s conversations with his mother always happen in monosyllabic bursts. Several times a day. Hux finds this endlessly fascinating, because he hasn’t heard from his own mother since he shook her hand goodbye before heading to the States.

Hux swivels around. Their shared cubicle is so small his knees almost hit Ben’s chair in the process. “Aww,” Hux taunts, “baby wuvs his mumsie.”

“Shut up, Hux,” Ben snaps without turning around. Hux notes the quick minimization of a Macy’s browser window. “You were hatched; your cold reptile heart doesn’t understand things like maternal affection.”

“I’ll have you know that Mothering Simulator Five was very effective.” Hux kicks the back of Ben’s chair. “What’s for lunch?”

Ben buries his face in his hands, a few tendrils of long hair coming out from his hipster-couture manbun. “Despair,” he replies, muffled in his palms.

Hux rolls his chair beside Ben and puts a hand on his—appallingly large, not that Hux has noticed—bicep. “If it’s any consolation, despair is on special today.”

Ben groans.

“How about the Chinese place?” Hux offers.

Ben finally looks at him with that special deadpan glare he reserves for notifying Hux he’s just said something stupid. “It closed down last month, remember?”

Hux thinks on it. “Not even a little.”

“You found a twig in your lo mein. Like a literal branch. With leaves.”

Hux shakes his head. “Doesn’t ring a bell.”

“Jesus, how do you have a job?”

“I give good head.” Hux stands and takes his suit jacket from the peg on the cube wall. “We’ll do pizza then. And you can tell me all about how you love your mather.”

“'Mother',” Ben replies, taking off his headset. “The word you’re looking for is ‘mother’.”

***

Ben talks with his mouth full, which Hux used to find gratingly irritating, but they’ve had lunch together five days a week for nearly half a decade, so Hux doesn’t bother wasting precious energy on Ben’s annoying tics anymore. Well, most of them. There are still a great many things Hux can’t fucking stand about Ben. Like how he cuts his toenails at his desk sometimes. Or the way he types with only four fingers yet still insists he’s an effective typist. Or how he keeps the sleeves of his too-tight dress shirts rolled up to the elbow in a way that distracts Hux from his precious work.

So while Hux is listening to an utterly rambling, banal story about Ben’s family—whom he discusses so often that Hux knows everyone by name, like characters in a never-ending, fucked-up sitcom—he averts his attention from Ben’s gaping, food-filled maw.

He tunes back in when he hears Ben say, “So now it’s a _destination_ wedding. They’re flying us all to Hawaii.”

“They’re what now?” Hux asks, hand frozen where it had been gently shaking parmesan onto his giant slice of pizza.

“They’re making me take a week out of my busy schedule—”

“You literally do nothing but work and play Minecraft.”

“— _busy schedule_ ,” Ben emphasizes, “to fly to Hawaii. Do you know how long that flight is? Ten hours. _Ten fucking hours._ What am I gonna do?”

“Most children bring a coloring book on flights.”

“Go suck a bag of dicks.”

Hux ignores him, as well as the mild stickiness of the parmesan shaker as he puts it away in the little caddie made out of an empty Bud Light six-pack box. “I can’t believe you’re complaining about a free trip to Hawaii.”

“It’s only free monetarily. The true cost is my sanity.”

“Of which you have remarkably little to spare.”

Ben stares at him and finally, blessedly, swallows his food. “How do you have friends?”

“Easy. I don’t.”

As much as he means it as a benign retort, it’s a fairly true statement. Other than the occasional drunken email or phone call from his father, daily lunch outings with Ben are his primary social outlet. That and the small talk with the elderly cashier lady at the market, who frequently asks about Hux’s cat. Which is perfectly fine with him, as most people manage to irritate him more than Ben does. And he enjoys talking about his cat.

“The point is,” Ben continues around a new bite of food, “I don’t want to go and I don’t think I should have to. And my mom insists I need to bring a date—”

Hux’s head snaps up. “She what?”

“Right? I told her it was ridiculous. The last person I dated was the girl I took to senior prom, who immediately ditched me to dance with Poe fucking Dameron. Who, by the way, is probably also going to be at the wedding, because his BFF is the one marrying my cousin.”

Hux’s stomach does a sad little flip at the mention of a _girl_ , momentarily collapsing his happy bubble of what has heretofore been gender ambiguity. He refuses to reflect too deeply on this, instead honing his attention on making himself sound as nonchalant as possible in regards to this promising new opportunity. “And your mother is paying for the whole thing? Travel, accommodations, food?”

“Yep,” Ben says, and takes a slurping, unnecessarily loud sip from his Mountain Dew.

“For you _and_ a guest,” Hux clarifies.

Ben scoffs. “She wishes.”

Hux leans forward, his elbows on the table. “Now, Benjamin, I want you to hear me out—”

Ben’s blank expression turns to horrified understanding, his eyes widening when he realizes what Hux is about to offer. “Don’t even say it.”

“There are benefits to be had here.”

“No.”

“If you bring me as your date,” Hux begins, “you can simultaneously appease your mother—”

“Stop it."

“—while sabotaging your cousin’s wedding with, ‘Surprise! Turns out I’m kinda gay.’”

“Absolutely not.”

“Think about it.” Hux makes a grandiose, sweeping motion with his arm. “The drama. The chaos. The rumors. The only thing better than a destination wedding is a heartwarming coming-out story to take the spotlight away from your selfish loved ones and their horrid pursuit of emotional fulfillment. Then you wait a few months, and announce it was all just a phase and you’re in fact happily engaged to...I don’t know, one of those body pillow things.”

Ben doesn’t have a response to that, leaning back in his booth with his arms crossed over his—wide, muscular, but again, Hux doesn’t notice these things—chest, so Hux continues, “And me, I’ll fall on the sword for you. I’ll be your knight in pressed khakis. I’ll keep your coloring books in my carry-on. I’ll engage your mother in lively-albeit-tasteful political discourse. And it’s all as a _favor_ to you, Benjamin, out of the kindness of my heart.”

Ben continues glaring at him, silent, his shapely jaw clenching as he chews on his straw in a way that makes Hux thinks he’s never had sex before.

Hux sighs as he figures out how to sweeten the pot. More than anything, he needs to get away for a while, clear his mind of all the bullshit work drama that continues to surface. “I’ll pick out the wedding gift.” When met with more silence, Hux finally relents, “And I’ll do your TPS reports for a month.”

Ben's stony expression breaks into a victorious smile. “Deal.”

***

“Hey, Hux?” Ben asks later, sometime after Hux’s accidental two p.m. desk-snooze.

“Yes, Benjamin?” Hux replies, mindlessly scrolling through swim trunk options, his cheek pressed against his fist. He has so much to prepare for.

“You only want to come to the wedding for a free vacation.”

It’s not a question. “I thought that was implied.” The silence that follows is filled with the idle clicking of Ben’s computer mouse and hushed phone voices in other cubicles. “Were you under the impression there was another reason?”

“No?” Ben replies, uncertain. Then more firmly, “No.”

“All right.” Something awkward is happening right now, Hux is sure of it. He just can’t put his finger on what. “If that’s a problem—”

“No, it’s nothing. Hey, do we have to bring our laptops to the meeting later?”

Hux gets a pop-up reminding him of the sales meeting in fifteen minutes, which says, in Phasma’s unrepentant fuschia Comic Sans, _BRING LAPTOPS_.

“Yes,” Hux says. He dismisses the conversation as Ben being, well, Ben, and glances at the sad dredges at the bottom of his Union Jack coffee mug. “But I need a refill first. Break room stop?”

***

“Next week we have someone from IT coming to talk with us about the new phone system,” Phasma says, standing from the conference table. Everyone begins shuffling papers back into their padfolios and shutting their laptops.

Hux stands up from the table and says, quietly enough so only Ben can hear him, “I hope we’ll still be allowed to make outbound calls. It would be a shame if our resident mama’s boy is withheld from his daily family gossip.”

Ben remains unfazed. “I’m not the one who spends an hour on Reddit every morning arguing about bee health.”

“Bees are _important_ , Ben—”

“Brendol,” Phasma announces from the head of the table. “A moment?”

Hux tries not to let his immediate spike of anxiety show. Every private interaction he’s had with Phasma over the past year has hinted in so many words that he’s dangerously close to getting canned. Phasma always has some dirt on him that he has to sidestep; she watches him like a sniper, waiting for him to screw up enough so she can staple a pink slip to his forehead and be done with him.

Ben leaves with a faux-apologetic look and Hux and Phasma are left alone. She pierces him with her cold, deadly stare and says, “A representative from Human Resources is coming by when you get back from PTO.”

Hux’s stomach drops, yet his voice remains steady as he replies, “Sounds like a party. How much should I chip in for pizza? You know those HR people are a ball of laughs.”

“We’ve been contacted by numerous competitors asking us to provide references on your behalf. Though your business acumen could use some work, I never took you for someone with so little tact.”

Hux drops his pen. Over the last few months, he’s been getting enigmatic calls and emails of companies trying to schedule interviews with him. He politely declines all of them, and until now had assumed it had something to do with the growing economy and a mysterious influx of LinkedIn traffic. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I haven’t applied anywhere else; you know I’m perfectly happy here.” He neglects to mention that he does, in fact, hate his job and that its only saving graces are his cube mate and a living wage. “I swear to you, they’re just headhunters.”

“I’d like to believe that, Brendol. But the higher-ups have gotten hold of it...” She doesn’t finish her sentence; she doesn’t need to. _And it doesn’t look good._

Hux bites his tongue to keep from saying anything rash. Instead he picks up his laptop and feigns a tight-lipped smile. “I look forward to meeting with them.”

Phasma adds, “I’ll send you a calendar invite.”

As Hux walks out of her line of sight, he gives her the finger.

***

The only time the wedding gets brought up again is if Hux brings it up, a pattern he notices immediately. Ben answers his questions in either clipped simple sentences or, _I don’t know_ , until finally Hux gets fed up. While walking together to the parking garage, where they always seem to park beside one another, Hux asks, “Have you told your mother you’re bringing a guest?” Since Ben has gotten so standoffish on the topic, Hux has stopped using the word _date_ and refuses to consider that Ben might be, in fact, homophobic. It’s 2016 for godsakes. Surely there must be another reason for Ben’s outright petulance; Hux just can’t figure out what it is.

“Yeah,” Ben says, clicking the remote start button on his mommy-purchased Bimmer just because he knows it annoys Hux.

“And what did she say?” Hux replies, suitably annoyed when the engine purrs to life from twenty feet away.

Ben shrugs. “That she’s looking forward to meeting...my guest.”

“That’s it? No, ‘Oh, Benny, congratulations!’”

“She’s not really a congratulatory kind of person. And I didn’t go into a lot of detail.”

Hux considers it. “Good call. Keep it mysterious.”

“So how’s the job search going?” Ben asks. Hux can’t tell if he’s teasing him about all the recruiter calls or asking a genuine question. Regardless, Hux hasn’t mentioned that his head is on the chopping block about it. He doesn’t want to cause Ben more stress than he already has to endure; even his daily phone conversations with his mother are turning from a short morning discussion to an hour or longer, his phone going off repeatedly with text messages throughout the day.

“I’m not looking for a new job. I like it here, but no one seems to believe that.”

Thankfully, Ben doesn’t inquire further. When they reach their cars, Hux opens the back door of his measly 2002 Corolla and tosses his briefcase inside. Before sliding into the driver’s seat, he looks at Ben again and says, with finality, “You know we leave in less than a week, right?”

Ben won’t look at him, instead fiddling with his keys. “Yeah, I know.”

“Good lord, Ben, what is the matter with you? Free vacation! A friend to help you keep your sanity while you navigate the terrible world of gratuitous wedding tradition! And did I mention _free vacation_?”

“‘Vacation'. You keep saying that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.”

Hux avoids rolling his eyes, but just barely, and refuses to take the Pop Culture Reference Battle bait. “Is that what’s bothering you? You honestly believe you’re not going to have a good time?”

“The Organa-Skywalker-Solo family gatherings are never a good time. That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you.”

“By not telling me anything at all. Excellent methodology there, Benjamin. Gold star for effective communication.”

Ben pinches the bridge of his sizeable nose. Hux is interrupted midway through coming up with a quip about large hands, large noses, and large—

“I don’t want you to freak out, is all,” Ben says. “If you’re in, you’re all in. You think it’s going to be easy but it’ll literally be the worst week of your life. There are...side effects to being, you know. My _guest_.”

It hits Hux, then, how little Ben actually knows about him if he thinks a week-long trip to Hawaii could ever be the worst time of Hux’s life. It also tells Hux what a privileged existence Ben must lead if a family gathering is his biggest problem.

“Side effects?” Hux asks. “Nausea? Dizziness? Open sores? Contusions? Halitosis? Bodily fungals—”

“We work together, okay?” Ben asks, loud and harsh in a tone Hux has never heard him use before. Ben is usually mild-mannered, albeit with a few quirks, though in the stories he tells he portrays himself as a sort of larger-than-life character with anger problems. Hux chalks it up to an off-center ideation of self, but he’s beginning to wonder if maybe, in turn, he doesn’t know Ben as well as he thought, either. “We work together, and when this is done, we have to come back here and see each other every day until you find a better job.”

Hux pauses, betrayed once more at the thought that even Ben seems to be encouraging him to leave the company. Either way, this is one of those situations where Hux has to choose between sarcasm or sincerity, and he’s never been particularly adept at making the right choice.

“Benjamin,” Hux begins, gaze boring into Ben, who looks something like an overlarge, scared puppy, “the only thing that will change is my cubicle.” Ben’s expression flits rapidly to puzzlement, which Hux clarifies with, “Because I will have covered every inch of it in as many embarrassing photos of you as I can fit onto my SIM card.”

***

Hux checks the time on his phone, a few minutes after five in the morning. He pounds on Ben’s door a second time, worried he’ll wake the neighbors, but with no other option to rouse Ben out of bed.

He hits Send again, letting Ben’s phone ring while simultaneously smashing his thumb against the doorbell, hoping a mix of noise will get Ben to open the damn door.

Finally he hears, muffled, “Jesus fuck, Hux, calm your tits.”

Ben opens the door, one fist rubbing the sleep out of his eye. His hair is a mess, loose t-shirt and pajama pants decidedly the opposite of what Hux is used to seeing. Hux realizes with a sudden discomfort—like getting pushed into a pool of freezing water—that he has to endure a week of this, of seeing Ben in other states of being. In the five years they’ve known each other, they’ve never once seen each other outside of work. The feeling is strange, a rapid foray into familiarity which is more jarring than Hux expected.

Ben looks him up and down, apparently similarly taken aback by Hux’s pressed khakis (he wasn’t kidding) and plaid shirt. “You look like something out of a Bret Easton Ellis novel.” He stops at Hux’s shoes. “Are those loafers? Who wears loafers?”

“They’re easy to slip off,” Hux explains. He looks around Ben’s apartment, which isn’t nearly as nice as his car, but still more than anything Hux could afford. The place is messy, if sparsely decorated to begin with, a studio with a bare mattress on the hardwood floor and loft windows that overlook the city. “Why aren’t you ready? We have a flight to catch.”

“At _eight_ ,” Ben says in disbelief. “Which is in three hours.”

“I like arriving early.”

“Well get comfortable. I still need to pack.”

Anxiety wrenches Hux’s gut. Of course Ben wouldn’t be prepared. Ben comes into every meeting five minutes late, a trail of loose papers flying out of his padfolio. Why would Hux ever have thought he packed in advance?

Ben pads away into what appears to be a walk-in closet. Hux looks around for a place to sit, and finding none, calls out, “There’s nowhere to sit.”

Pretentious band t-shirts fly out of the closet, piling on the floor, and Ben replies, “So stand.”

***

They board the plane, an enormous Boeing 747 with two seats on each side and four seats in the middle. Hux mildly hoped that Ms. Organa had sprung for first class, but no luck.

Somewhat predictably, Ben had been taken out of the TSA line for private screening, which is exactly why Hux wanted to get to the airline early, because even if Ben has no idea how large and intimidating he is, Hux is fully aware. And so is the TSA, apparently.

They still made it to the gate half an hour before boarding, which they spent in amicable silence, Ben with a pair of enormous headphones around his neck, sipping a venti doctored with more cream and sugar than coffee. Hux had stared out the window to the terminal, foot tapping repeatedly and watching the gate fill with people.

Now on the plane, Ben takes Hux’s carry-on and puts it in the overhead bin, which is uncharacteristically considerate of him. But just as Hux is about to get into his assigned seat, Ben says, “I want the window seat.”

Hux sighs. “Why?” People lined up behind them shift and fidget in anticipation, waiting for them to sit.

“I like looking out the window.”

“The window seat is mine. It says so on my boarding pass.”

In lieu of a response, Ben pouts.

“Oh for godsakes,” Hux relents, and shuffles back into the aisle, brushing bodily against Ben, which doesn’t feel strange at all, considering the close quarters they maintain forty hours a week. At least, that’s what Hux tells himself.

Ben curls his enormous body into the tiny seat, gangly limbs folding with surprising grace. He arches up to get the seatbelt out from under him, and Hux settles into the aisle seat to do the same, along with all the other awkward nonsense involved with flying.

They are both far too tall for coach seating. And they have to endure this for ten hours. Ben may have had a point in regards to his initial complaint.

Hux immediately begins fiddling with the little television screen in front of him, scrolling through film options. When he tires of it, he flips through _SkyMall_. By the time he’s finished, the plane is almost full and he has to unbutton the top button of his shirt to abate the stale heat of the cabin.

“Jesus, Hux, will you chill out?”

The seatbelt sign flips on and the engine turns. A flight attendant notifies them to turn off all major electronic devices. “You’ve known me five years, Benjamin, and this is the first time you have ever mistakenly associated the world ‘chill’ with ‘Hux’.”

“I knew this was a bad idea,” Ben tells the seat in front of him. “I knew you’d freak out.”

“I’m not freaking out!” The passengers near him look in his direction and he lowers his voice to a hissed whisper. “Has it occurred to you that I’m nervous about flying?”

Ben looks at him from the corner of his eye, his headphone speakers trapped at his temples instead of his ears for some reason. “Are you nervous about flying?”

The plane jolts forward and Hux stifles a gasp. The first and last time he’d flown was ten years ago, to America, and he didn’t like it much then, either. It had been so long that he had forgotten flying bothered him. “Why thank you for asking. Yes, I am.”

Ben sighs, and Hux thinks he’s about to put his headphones back on his ears for ten hours of ignoring Hux’s general neuroticism, as they do at work, but instead he takes Hux’s hand in his own. It’s huge, and rough, and warm, and Hux’s breath is a little bit caught in his throat. Because of the flying.

“What are you doing?” Hux asks, but doesn’t let go.

“Consider it practice,” Ben replies, and uses his other hand to return his headphones to his ears. He closes his eyes, and as the plane takes off, neither of them mention how tightly Hux holds onto him.

***

Hux had figured a ten-hour plane ride wouldn’t be so bad, considering he spends eight hours a day sitting at a desk, but the cramped space coupled with the recycled air and the fact he cannot get over sitting _in the fucking sky_ makes it somewhat tedious. Ben, however, nods off within the first hour, head lolling forward and then to the side. Eventually, of course, landing on Hux’s shoulder.

At this interesting turn of events, Hux glances around. No one is watching him, and besides, they’re trying to be a couple anyway. And with the hand-holding and incessant bickering and now the shoulder-sleeping, no one would think such a gesture is odd. It’s affectionate, Hux reasons. Not creepy.

Okay, maybe a little creepy.

Subtly, Hux tilts his head just so, because he’s always wanted to, and presses his nose to Ben’s hair. And closes his eyes. And breathes.

Ben’s hair is as soft as he’s always imagined it, and smells, somehow, better than he’d imagined it. Like whatever glorious product makes it so shiny and wonderful, of course, but also something else. Like warmth, maybe. Spice. Someone else’s home.

Hux gets a grip on himself and leans back on the headrest, focusing his energy on the dread of likely being drooled on in the near future, but before he can hash out a witty retort for when Ben wakes up, he falls asleep too.

***

Landing. Landing is much, much worse than lift-off. Hux’s ears won’t stop popping and it _hurts_. It really, really hurts. Ben is awake now and is trying vainly to calm him, saying things Hux can’t hear because his hands are over his ears like a child.

The only thing that manages to soothe him is Ben’s hand on his knee. That big, bumbling hand that doesn’t know how to type properly and makes everything it holds seem small by comparison. Hux takes Ben’s hand again, not caring how pathetic it probably seems, but is reassured when Ben squeezes back.

“Work your jaw,” Ben says, opening and closing his mouth in a way that makes him look like a beached fish.

Hux has been told he has a dirty mind, and tries his damnedest to maintain a shred of professionalism in the workplace, but given the stress of the moment, he blurts out, “Are you offering me something to work my jaw _on_ or are we waiting until we get to the hotel?”

Ben’s mouth gets stuck in the open position while the tops of his cheeks tinge pink. Thankfully, a flight attendant interrupts them with a polite, “Please fasten your seatbelt and return your seat to the upright position,” which forces Ben to let go of Hux’s hand (unfortunately) and fasten his seatbelt again.

***

The second Hux makes it outside the airport, the entire flight becomes worth it. The air smells like sugar and there are _palm trees_ and flowers and a cool sea breeze. He’s mildly disappointed no one greets them with leis, but he gets a little thrill seeing them for sale. He’s tickled that all the trash cans read _mahalo_ and people are honest-to-god saying “aloha” instead of hello and goodbye.

Hux hadn’t been particularly excited about the trip, mainly because his emotional spectrum only ranges from amusement to annoyance, but now that he’s here, he’s a bit elated in a way the business version of himself would find immature.

He glances at Ben, whose luggage consists of a backpack and a hanging bag for his suit, which he has draped behind his shoulder. His headphones are still around his neck, but now a pair of aviators top his head while he concentrates on his phone. He sighs in irritation. “The driver is on his way. He should have been waiting for us.”

“We don’t have to be anywhere until tomorrow. I think we can spare the time,” Hux replies.

“I know, sorry. I just want to get this over with.”

Hux sidles next to Ben and nudges him with his elbow. Ben looks at him and smiles, eyes crinkling at the corners, affectionate and fond, maybe, as their gaze lingers a moment too long.

Hux is just about to break the tension with a snide remark when a black car pulls in front of them.

***

By the time Ben shoves Hux into a shiny gold elevator, it’s only four in the afternoon, but Hux is almost asleep on his feet. He sags against the elevator wall, thankful for air conditioning. Ben, the bastard, doesn’t seem to be affected in the slightest.

“How are you not exhausted?” Hux asks, somewhere around floor seventeen.

Ben doesn’t bother looking up from his phone. “That’s my secret, Hux.” The elevator door opens and Ben steps out. He looks back and adds, “I’m always exhausted.”

He leads them down hallways marked by crown molding and gaudy hibiscus floral carpeting, eventually finding their room after what feels like trudging through an immense labyrinth. Hux is so relieved to have finally reached their destination that he doesn’t hesitate to stumble in and collapse onto the bed.

Which is when he realizes, with no small amount of horror, there is only one bed.

As if reading his mind, Ben says, “Oh sure, no problem, you go ahead take up the entire thing with your tiny ginger beanpole body. I’ll take the floor. It’s fine.”

Hux rolls over to glare at Ben, who is leaning against the counter of the kitchenette, arms across his chest. His biceps strain the sleeves of his Decemberists t-shirt, so different yet similar from the way they strain his dress shirts, that it hits Hux: he’s not at work anymore. He’s splayed out on a bed, which he has to share with his coworker, thousands of miles from either of his homes. And worst of all, he has to pretend to be _in love_ with this idiot. How he thought he could manage all of this without freaking out is beyond him, and it pains him to think that Ben was right, he is _absolutely_ going to freak out, and this trip _is_ going to change the careful balance between them, and everything is going to be ruined—

Ben picks up a laminated card from the counter and inspects it. “You want to order room service and watch some YouTube?”

The knot in Hux’s chest slowly comes untangled. It’s a question Ben more or less asks him several times a week, on the occasion that they bring their lunches back to their desks and spend an hour together watching whatever channel Ben queued up that day. It’s _normal_. This is all normal. It’s going to be fine. It has to be.


	2. Chapter 2

“Hux,” Ben whispers.

Hux sighs. He hasn’t slept well, namely because he can’t remember the last time he slept with someone beside him. Even though the bed is a luxurious king, both he and Ben are over six foot, which makes everything a bit cramped. Still, he’d been thrilled when, after a sizable room service meal and several hours of YouTubing, Ben drifted off easily, saving Hux having to come up with some snappy commentary to ease the awkwardness of sharing a bed. He managed to slip into the bathroom and change into pajamas, brush his teeth, and turn off all the lights without waking Ben. Ben of course remained fully clothed, and Hux managed to stare at his sleeping form for only a handful of seconds too long.

 _Angelic_ was the word that came to mind before Hux’s internal sass machine got the better of him and erased it, replacing it with _asshole_.

Now, Ben gently nudges Hux’s shoulder, and Hux is strongly considering ignoring him until he stops. “Huuuuux,” Ben adds, more urgently this time.

Hux won’t open his eyes, because he knows it’s still dark outside, and such hours shouldn’t be acknowledged by wakefulness. He’s too tired to reply with words. “Hmmm?”

“I can’t sleep.”

Hux doesn’t deign that with a response.

“And I forgot to ask,” Ben continues whispering, even though there’s no reason. “Have you been to Hawaii before?”

“No,” Hux manages. Why Ben couldn’t have this conversation later, when the sun is up and Hux has had enough coffee to function, is beyond him.

“Have you ever seen the ocean?”

“Of course I’ve seen the ocean.” Hux’s voice is scratchy and muffled in his pillow. “How do you think we got here?”

“No, I mean, from the beach.”

Hux considers it, grogginess seeping away. He’s seen large bodies of water, of course. The Thames. Lake Michigan. He’d lived his entire life inland, though, and rarely went too far from home. Then he moved to Chicago. So, he supposes, he’s never seen an ocean. “I guess not.”

“You wanna?”

Hux finally rolls over to look at Ben, and finds him propped on his elbow, looming over Hux, entirely too close. Hux’s eyes take a moment to adjust to the darkness. The watery dawn cracking through the curtains casts a lovely glow over Ben, his hair down and tucked behind his ear, still wearing yesterday’s outfit. And, somehow, wide awake.

“Can’t we later?” Hux asks.

He figures Ben is prepared to give a lengthy over-explanation justifying this nonsense, and Hux is actually looking forward to it because Ben’s voice will likely lull him to sleep the same way it does at work. Instead Ben says, “Nope,” and rolls off the bed.

***

After having put on yesterday’s pants, an undershirt, and his loafers, Hux follows Ben out of the hotel and onto the streets of Honolulu. By the time they make it outside, the sky is a hazy blue, the occasional car driving down the road beside them, and very few people walking about. A mild breeze comes in from the ocean, and for once it’s quiet enough that Hux can hear it, white noise in the distance that alerts him, before he can even see it, to its unfathomable magnitude.

Ben seems to know exactly where they are, which Hux just now finds strange, so he says, “I take it you’ve been here before.”

“Yep,” Ben replies, “every summer for most of my life.”

Ben has always taken his two weeks’ worth of vacation in the summer, though to Hux’s knowledge has never gone anywhere. Instead he texts Hux on his days off, teasing him for having to work while he gets to laze around doing nothing. A staycation, he calls it.

For totally unrelated reasons, Ben’s vacation weeks are Hux’s least favorite time of year.

“I stopped going after I turned eighteen. I hate it here,” Ben explains.

Hux hates nearly everything in life—from most films, to his own hair, to both political systems he’s been privy to—but even he can’t manage to hate Hawaii. There’s nothing to hate about it, other than maybe the cost of things. So far Ben has purchased everything for them, though, so Hux can’t reasonably hate that either.

“How?”

Ben guides them down a narrow alleyway, where each square of sidewalk is coated with increasing amounts of sand. “For one,” Ben replies, “I hate sand. Two, it’s boring going the same place every year. I know my mom loves it, and my dad doesn’t really have an opinion, and Rey and her dad love it too. But, I don’t know, if I’m gonna sit on a plane for half a day, I’d rather go somewhere I’ve never been.”

“There’s nothing stopping you; you have two weeks’ vacation every year. That’ll get you a good trip most places.”

Ben shrugs. Maybe it’s the quiet of the morning, or maybe it’s that they slept next to each other last night, but more sincerity than Hux thought Ben capable of tinges his words: “I wouldn’t want to go alone.”

Before Hux can figure out how to crush Ben’s ephemeral vulnerability, they walk onto the beach. Soft, nearly white sand immediately fills Hux’s loafers. Ben doesn’t have the same problem, having smartly worn flip-flops, and Hux is conflicted with a number of sarcastic remarks when he finally lets his eyes rest on the horizon.

Every thought shoved into his sad little brain collapses.

He’d seen it in pictures, of course. And on television. A bird’s eye view. But never this, never the golden sliver of the sun peeking above an infinite expanse of blue. Pinks and reds and oranges mix in the sky and reflect off of fluffy clouds above them. The waves crash onto the beach one after the other, stopping and hauling back mere feet before reaching Hux’s toes.

A sparse handful of people walk or jog down the beach, but otherwise it’s empty. Ben finds a clear area and sits down, patting the sand beside him.

“I thought you hated sand,” Hux says.

Ben looks out onto the ocean, running a hand through his hair to steady it in the dull, sweet breeze. “I deal.”

So Hux takes a seat next to him, palms gritty, and watches the sunrise.

***

Hux glances once more at his phone, which tells him it’s a quarter to eleven even though his body is telling him it’s much later. When he hears the shower turn off, he raises his voice to say, “We’re going to be late.”

He rolls up the sleeves of his dress shirt when the bathroom door opens behind him. “Brunch is an elevator ride away.”

Hux turns around to say something about being an easier ride than that, but the thought flies away when he catches sight of Ben, half-naked and dripping wet, a towel draped low on his hips while he rifles through his suitcase.

Hux was wrong: a human being does not get the body Ben has by only working and playing Minecraft. If Hux had any idea such a sculpted form lie beneath layers of poorly fitted, rumpled dress shirts, he probably would have made so many accidental innuendos that it bordered on harassment. Ben is tan and glistening, long wavy hair dripping onto his chest. Hux can even see the barest outline of his cock underneath the towel, and his own twitches with overwhelming wishful thinking.

Ben waves a hand in front of Hux’s face. Apparently he’d been staring. “Hux? Are you okay?”

Hux’s eyes snap to Ben’s face, his jaw closing from having dropped sometime in the last few horrible moments. “Hurry up, we don’t want mumsie Solo thinking an excellent boyfriend such as myself lets you get away with tardiness.”

Then before he does something stupid like throw Ben on the bed and make them even later to brunch, he leaves the hotel room to pace in front of the elevator and think about TPS reports.

***

Two minutes before they’re due to arrive at brunch, Ben meets Hux at the elevators, wearing a pair of tattered jeans and a Sonic Youth t-shirt. Hux looks him up and down—no risk of popping a boner this time around, thank god—and says, “You couldn’t have made a little more effort?”

“Why would I? It’s just my family.”

“Yes, but you’re introducing us.”

“So? Why do I have to look nice for that?”

“Because it would reflect better on me.”

The elevator doors slide open and Hux steps on, smashing his thumb against the top-floor button where a rooftop restaurant is waiting with their reservations.

“It doesn’t matter what my parents think of you,” Ben adds. “As soon as this is over, I’m telling them we broke up.”

An ugly feeling washes over Hux, akin to nausea. He dismisses it as the elevator rising too quickly. “Fair enough,” Hux mutters.

***

While Hux had spent weeks contemplating how to behave around Leia Organa and Han Solo, the exact level of polite reservation to portray and the best way to hone his admittedly dry and self-deprecating sense of humor into something charismatic instead of generally irritating, nothing could have prepared him for how _Ben_ would behave.

The moment they enter the restaurant, without even glancing at Hux, Ben takes Hux’s hand and threads their fingers together. He says, “Remember: be really, really gay,” and pulls—with no small amount of strength—Hux toward an ocean view table whereupon an unhappy-looking older couple sit.

Hux doesn’t have to pretend to be _really_ gay because he already kind of is, or so he’s been told, so at least he has that covered.

When they approach the table, both Leia and Han stand, Leia with her arms outstretched toward Ben. “Oh Benny,” she says, opening and closing her hands at him.

“Mom!” Ben lets go of Hux and pulls her in for a hug. The term _mama’s boy_ once more crosses Hux’s mind, which remains a mystery considering how much Ben avoids actually seeing his mother and the disdain with which he speaks of her. “Dad,” he adds, letting go of her and giving Han a slightly more reserved hug.

Which is when Hux realizes: out of hundreds of eavesdropped family phone calls, he isn’t sure he’s ever heard Ben talk to his father. He’s listened to Ben tell stories about Han, Han’s own stories told by Ben, and endless conjectures about how Han is essentially a terrible person who means well on rare occasion, but Hux has never heard them interact. It’s hard to believe a man who has lived such an outlandish life could look so...normal.

And Hux is in the midst of dwelling on this when Ben puts his massive arm around Hux’s waist and pulls him close, saying with pride, “This is my boyfriend, Hux.”

Hux doesn’t miss it on either Han or Leia’s faces: the flicker of surprise that Baby Boomers get when faced with retraining their minds from how they would have reacted long ago versus how they should react now.

Ben went for the kill after all. Hux imagines Ben spent the past month using the word _guest_ repeatedly, only waiting until now to drop the bomb. Genius, Hux thinks. He personally might have gone for something flashier—maybe over a toast, or announcing it at the rehearsal dinner, but there’s also a kind of beauty in bringing it up so early on, letting rumors and speculation spread slowly like a virus.

Leia is the first to smile warmly, extending a hand to Hux. “It’s lovely meeting you.”

“And you, Ms. Organa,” Hux says with the voice he reserves for business calls. “I’ve heard so much about you.”

Her eyebrows raise and she shoots a small glare at Ben. “Then I hope you’ll give me a chance to fix your impression of me.”

The passive-aggressive jab is interrupted by Han also extending his hand. “Good to meet you.”

Hux doesn’t venture to add anything this time, settling on, “You as well, sir.”

“Introductions accomplished,” Ben says with far more expressiveness than Hux usually sees in him. “Now let’s eat and make painful small talk.”

***

And painful it is. Hux wants to be on his game, he really does, but he is far too mesmerized by this _Benny_ person and whatever he’s done with Hux’s coworker Ben Solo, the unrepentant nerd god who only speaks when spoken to (except with Hux) and never laughs (except at Hux). Benny borders on hyperverbal, makes eye contact, doesn’t slouch, exudes an air of something between righteousness and rage, and—most surprising—puts his napkin on his lap.

Hux can’t get a word in edgewise, especially when polite conversation turns rapidly into impolite conversation, Leia immediately-yet-subtly guilting Ben for not being more helpful in regards to wedding planning (“It's really been a strain on Rey and I. We could use more hands on deck.”) and Ben not-subtly-at-all dismissing it (“Weddings are nothing more than an unnecessary spectacle steeped in even more unnecessary traditionalism. They’re a waste of time and money.”).

“How was the flight?” Leia asks, attempting to diffuse the argument. The server comes by and brings her another Mai Thai, which by Hux’s count is her fourth, and they haven’t gotten their food yet.

Hux opens his mouth to reply, but Ben beats him to it, on his third cup of coffee, which Hux knows from personal experience to be a very bad sign. Default-state sullen Ben is one thing. Hyper Ben is worse. Hux has no idea what over-caffeinated Benny will be like.

“Terrible,” Ben says. “You do realize I’m not five anymore, right? Coach seating is really not a great option for me.”

Leia sighs. Hux accidentally makes eye contact with Han, who appears similarly distraught as he twists his straw wrapper into an impressive, complicated knot.

“Benny,” Leia chastises, finishing off her drink. She holds it up so the server will see she needs another. “I’m flying two dozen people to Honolulu. I really couldn’t splurge for first class.”

“You asked. I answered,” Ben says, and downs his coffee. Like Leia, he holds his cup up when the server returns, blessedly with their food.

“It wasn’t that bad,” Hux offers. “Ben slept most of the time.” Then he adds, for the sake of keeping Ben in check, and also a little to piss him off, “Mind if I try that, honey?” He points his fork to Ben’s hashbrowns and bites his cheek to keep from smiling. Of Ben’s dozens of pet peeves—which he once wrote out for Hux and pinned to his cubicle so Hux would stop blowing his nose at his desk—sharing food is near the top. Number three, to be exact, underneath _people who bring tennis shoes to work just to walk to lunch in them_ and _Comic Sans_. Both of which refer directly to Phasma.

Hux doesn’t miss the heavy swallow that makes Ben’s throat bob. “Absolutely, babe. Go for it.”

Hux takes not one, but _two_ pieces of potato, and thinks Ben might burst a blood vessel. Leia and Han watch in thinly veiled horror as Hux does this with ease. “Those are delicious,” Hux confirms around his bite, then turns his attention to Leia. “What about _your_ flight?”

***

“That could have gone a lot worse,” Ben says slumped against the corner of the elevator as they make their way back to their hotel room, exhausted like he performed a series of heart surgeries between triathlons.

“I had a lovely time,” Hux replies. “Your parents are nothing like you’ve portrayed them. I was expecting your mother to have three heads and your father to, I don’t know, pull a gun on someone.”

Ben gives him a blank stare. “It’s early yet.” He thunks his head against the wall. “The big gathering is gonna be a lot worse. And we need to amp it up a bit.”

It takes Hux three floors before he figures out what Ben is saying. “Why?”

“Mom’s suspicious. I can feel it.”

“You sound more paranoid than usual, which is a feat considering you won’t even give the last four digits of your Social over the phone in case the NSA is listening. And how is it any of her business?”

“First of all, the NSA _is_ listening—”

“But why would they care? Social Security and NSA are both administrations of the same government.”

“—and everything is her business, and she knows me better than I know me, and sometimes she can read my mind.” Ben sighs. “If she calls us out, I’ll never hear the end of it. The only reason she hasn’t put me on wedding prep duty is because she thinks you and I are having a romantic getaway.”

The elevator doors slide open and they walk out, Hux batting his eyelashes at Ben. “But aren’t we, darling?”

When they reach their room, Ben pulls the keycard out of his pocket. “Point is, we need to be more convincing.” He shoves it in the lock and they enter the room again. The door shuts behind them. “She knows I’ve done worse things to get out of social obligations...” He continues nervously rambling in a way that Hux is far too familiar with. After several hours of _Benny_ , it’s unbelievably comforting to have his Benjamin back, no filter, thinking out loud trying to analyze his own pitiful mind.

But Hux isn’t really listening anymore anyway (not like he ever pays much attention to Ben’s philosophical self-waxing), his brain having halted to a stop somewhere around _more convincing_. He watches Ben’s lips move—Ben’s plush, soft lips that Hux has spent five years adamantly avoiding for the exact same reason he is now moving closer to them.

“If she figures it out, that’s it for us,” Ben continues. “We’ll spend every minute of this trip as laboring grunts. She’ll probably give us walkie talkies. It’ll be miserable, Hux, just—”

So Hux kisses him.

It’s a small thing, chaste and simple, Hux’s hand on Ben’s cheek, Ben feeling like an enormous, indestructible brick wall. A marble statue. Other analogies for things that don’t move or bend or listen to their mothers.

Ben doesn’t react, of course, because he more closely resembles a sad t-rex than a human being, but the kiss succeeds in two endeavors: getting Ben to shut up, and satisfying Hux’s curiosity about what Ben’s lips feel like against his own. Not that he’d held that curiosity for longer than the few moments prior to the kiss, of course.

“What was that for?” Ben asks, somewhere between awed and irritated.

Hux shrugs. “Consider it practice.”

***

Ben was right: the big gathering _is_ a lot worse.

Leia had rented out a room in an upscale restaurant on the other side of Waikiki. Nearly everyone is dressed somewhat formally except for Ben, whose only addition to his earlier wardrobe is a plaid overshirt. When Ben introduces Hux as his boyfriend, everyone has nearly the same facial reactions, which are so apparent Hux can almost read the thoughts that go along with them: surprise ( _I didn’t know you were—_ ), followed by doubt ( _This is Benny we’re talking about_ ), then that nanosecond blip of resolve ( _I can’t wait to tell such-and-so about this_ ), finally landing on trained tolerance for a few and polite acceptance for most.

That is, except for Rey, who squeals in delight and nearly knocks Hux over in a hug.

“Benny’s told me so much about you!” she says, holding both of his hands in hers. Hux recalls that Rey is the only family member Ben doesn’t verbally lacerate behind her back. He even went so far as to call her _nice_  once. But Hux hadn’t been expecting the tall, thin, beautiful woman before him with a wide smile and bright eyes. Hux thinks Ben maybe undersold her a bit.

“Has he?” Hux asks, glancing at Ben, who is standing closer than he normally would but not touching him, probably because Leia hasn’t arrived yet. Ben rubs the back of his neck and lifts a shoulder in reluctant admittance.

“You work together, right?” She glances at Ben too, uncertain, like maybe she shouldn’t have said anything.

Hux rolls with it. “Shh,” he says. “We have to keep it under wraps in the workplace. It’s all very hush-hush.”

“Oh, how romantic!” Rey replies. She reminds Hux of a cross between a Disney princess and a mack truck—soft femininity and enthusiasm on the outside, but could also mow down anything in her path without remorse. This specific trait seems to run in the family.

Leia and Han enter, and Ben’s arm immediately wraps around Hux’s waist again, tighter than before, his enormous hand gripping Hux’s hip in a way that is definitely _not_ completely arousing and doesn’t at all put images in Hux’s head of what Ben’s hands would feel like all over his body.

“I have to go speak to Aunt Leia, but I’m looking forward to chatting again!” Rey squeezes Hux’s shoulder and hails Leia.

Hux proceeds to meet more people than he can keep track of, though he does manage to remember Rey and Finn, because they’re the ones getting married, an older gentleman named Lando who talks to Hux at length about money laundering for a reason Hux absolutely cannot figure out, and a startlingly large silent man whom everyone refers to as _Uncle Chewie_.

The dinner is a buffet, so most people eat intermittently and everyone drinks. Ben clutches the can of Monster he bought at an ABC store on their way over like his life depends on it, and Hux is so overwhelmed he decides to start in on the wine earlier than anticipated, namely because _Benny_ is out in full force—interrupting people, talking down to them, being overall excessively contrary and entitled—and Hux can’t handle it. No wonder everyone is surprised Ben has a boyfriend; to them, he’s incorrigible.

“Hey,” Ben says, apropos nothing while Hux is picking at the remains of his dinner plate. They’ve reached a peaceful lull in the activity where no one is stampeding over to meet the new guy. Hux briefly and accidentally makes eye contact with Leia from across the room, who is in discussion with both Rey and Finn—and although it’s the barest of a moment, Hux gets the strong impression she’s been watching him the whole time—then turns his attention to Ben.

Before the word _what_ escapes his lips, Ben seals them with his own. Hux stifles an involuntary gasp and is thankfully tipsy enough to lose any potential reservation about propriety he may have had. He sinks into Ben’s embrace.

Ben kisses like he works—terrible if he doesn’t care, like most tasks he’s given; or ill-prepared, like the kiss in the hotel room; but exceptional the rest of the time. Like right now, trying to prove something to Leia and whoever else is watching. Hux doesn’t really know what all that something entails, but it feels more complicated than Ben let on. Regardless of what it is, Hux is happy to comply if it means more of this.

Hux loses himself a bit and nips at Ben’s lower lip. Ben lets out a greedy, needy little growl of a moan that is neither Benny nor his Benjamin, but someone else entirely, someone with fire and fury, overpowering like how Ben describes himself in his stories. Maybe that fictional character is real somewhere, not just in Ben’s skewed self-perception. Hux is endlessly curious about this man who is neither the timid nerd Ben, nor the insufferable brat Benny, so much so that when Ben breaks away an inch, Hux nearly chases after him.

Instead he says, “When you said _amp up_ I didn’t think you meant a tonsil exam in front of your entire family.”

Ben replies in a low lull that crawls down Hux’s spine and settles deep inside him: “You don’t seem to be complaining.”

Last night’s easy, platonic bed-sharing is going to be enormously difficult to replicate.

A cleared throat beside them jars Hux from the moment. Leia is smiling down at them, lips tight so it looks more like a grimace. A dry martini rests in one hand, and the other is on the shoulder of—

“Hux, have you met Poe Dameron?” Leia asks.

—a glaringly handsome man whom Hux gets the immediate, distinct impression is about as straight as a Mobius strip. He wears a crisp red shirt and gray pants, his dark hair slicked back and jaw shadowed with just enough stubble on his chin to make Hux think about how it might scratch against his inner thighs.

“Seriously, Mom?” Ben asks, standing. “You’re really doing this right now?” Then to Hux, he adds, “Excuse me a minute, babe. I’ll be right back.” He takes an exasperated Leia by the arm and guides her away.

“Sorry about that,” Poe says with an apologetic shrug. He holds out his hand for Hux to take.

Hux does, avoiding standing because that would be a _bad idea_ , instead offering the seat across from him. “I take it this is a normal occurrence.”

“Benny and I don’t really get along anymore.”

“To be fair, _Benny_ doesn’t appear to be getting along with anyone.”

Poe lets out a charming little laugh. “You caught onto that, huh? How long you two been dating?”

“Oh, um.” They hadn’t discussed it. Hux opts for vagueness. “On and off for a few years now. Just got serious six months ago or so.” Six months ago they’d been working on a project together and nearly tore each other’s throats out. Same difference.

“Man, never thought I’d see the day Benny settled down.” Poe shakes his head, and even that’s endearing. No wonder Ben hates him—Ben hates most things that are nice and good, which is probably why he likes Hux so much.

Hux has had enough to drink that his next question slips out: “May I ask why?”

“I mean, you oughta know him better than anybody. Guy flies off the handle at the slightest provocation. Doesn’t really make for a real happy relationship.”

Hux eyes him, wary, mostly due to the familiarity in his words, but Poe takes it as offense, leaning forward and putting his hand on Hux’s arm.

“Oh, god, sorry, I didn’t mean to imply—”

“No, it’s fine. That’s just...not the Ben I know is all.”

“Well, I know it's not my business, but you two seem really happy.”

Hux glances around for Ben but can’t find him anywhere. He gives up and takes another sip of his wine. He’s already starting to get a headache. “Yes, we are.”

Poe laughs again, a raspy sound that Hux finds too inviting for its simplicity. “Let’s hope it stays that way, huh? Weddings are tough business.”

***

By the time they leave dinner, the busses have stopped running, so Ben calls them a cab. The drive to the hotel is silent and tense, until Hux finally asks, “What’s your problem with Poe?”

“It’s a long story.”

“It’s a long car ride.”

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Is this about Poe stealing your prom date?”

Ben stares out the window instead of answering, which is what he does when he wants to lie but can’t, because he’s terrible at it. Once he ate Hux’s doughnut—the damn hypocrite—while Hux was in the bathroom, and instead of just admitting to it, crafted an entire saga about the shredder guy coming by and asking if he could have it, followed by a lengthy, guilt-ridden introspective lecture on Ben’s inability to acknowledge boundaries and thus his trouble saying no to people, none of which Hux was particularly interested in because he was too busy being angry about his lost doughnut.

Hux gives up; he’s exhausted from people who are not Ben for so long, exhausted by Benny, exhausted by newness and travel and being homesick, exhausted by being someone he’s not.

It’s not that he minds being Good Boyfriend Hux, it’s that maybe he likes it too much, and he’s tired enough to acknowledge that when they get back to Chicago, he’s not going to be thrilled at becoming Coworker Hux again. Sleeping alone. Convincing himself he’s not attracted to Ben by overemphasizing his undesirable traits and then making fun of him for them. Like a child with a crush—

Hux stops that thought right in its tracks.

He likes what they have; he doesn’t want things to change between them, so they won’t, and that’s all there is to it.

***

Hux dreads the awkwardness of tonight’s bed sharing adventure, and tries to figure out any way out of it—he could go to the roof and pretend to call...well, under any other circumstance, he would call Ben; he doesn’t really know anyone else. He could stay in the shower as long as possible. He could pretend to catch up on work, but they both know Phasma’s been handling it because she can do both their jobs and everyone else’s without batting an eye.

Anything to keep them from crawling into bed together at the same time and sharing that single, horrible moment of mutual reflection that they made out not three hours ago. And while Hux definitely enjoyed it, he has no idea if Ben did too or if it was all an act. Hux never thought of Ben as a particularly adept actor but everything he thought he knew about his cube-mate has been thrown out the window like bearer bonds from the Nakatomi Plaza.

Hux exits the bathroom in his pajamas, teeth brushed, resigned to his fate. Ben is beside the bed, pulling his shirt over his head, which he tosses on the floor. His belt buckle and pants follow.

“Have you no shame?” Hux asks, appalled that Ben did not appear to bring pajamas. He doesn’t even wear boxers, but briefs. Black ones. Saxx, to be precise, and Hux thinks he might faint.

Ben looks down at himself, then back at Hux. “Why would I?”

“For the love of god,” Hux mumbles, and switches off his light so he doesn’t have to look at Ben’s obnoxiously attractive body anymore. He crawls into bed and stays as close to the edge as possible, yanking the covers above his shoulder.

A dip in the mattress signals Ben sliding into bed too, followed by plugging in his phone, followed by the other light switching off.

And now they’re in darkness.

And now is the moment Hux has been dreading. All he can hear is Ben’s breathing; all he can feel is Ben’s body heat; all he can think about is Ben’s mouth.

Too many minutes pass. Based solely on Ben’s shallow breathing, neither of them have fallen asleep yet.

“Hey Hux?” Ben asks.

Hux sighs. “What.”

“Are you gay?”

Out of all the things Hux thought were about to come out of Ben’s mouth, that wasn’t one of them. “What gave it away?” He rolls from his side onto his back. “Was it my tongue in your mouth? The incessant blowjob jokes? That one time I needed you to fix my computer and you found out my password was ‘dat ass’?”

“I thought that was a joke,” Ben says to the ceiling.

“Of course it was. A joke. Definitely a joke.”

Hux sighs again. “I’m serious, though.”

“Yes, Ben, I’m gay.”

He feels Ben roll onto his side and prop himself on his elbow like this morning. Surely he’s too close—they have a whole bed, and Hux is squished to the furthest side. “When did you come out to your parents?”

“I didn’t.”

“So they don’t know you’re—”

“Of course they know. I’ve just never bothered hiding it.”

“Your parents sound awesome.” Not that Ben would know, because to Hux’s knowledge he’s never mentioned them.

“They’re not. It wasn’t fun, but it never occurred to me to pretend to be someone I wasn’t. I’m not that smart.” When Ben doesn’t reply, Hux ventures, “Why?”

The bed shifts as Ben shrugs. “I just...never thought I’d come out to my parents either is all.”

“Are _you_ gay?” Hux tries to ask nonchalantly, when in reality it’s a question he’s been wondering since he first met Ben. Usually he can just _tell_ , but Ben is a big question mark on Hux’s gaydar, bi-fi, queer gear, what have you.

“I have no idea,” Ben admits. “I haven't thought about it much before n—before.”

Hux doesn’t know what to say to that, so he makes a noncommittal noise and rolls back on his side.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Guest beta by best human, [linguamortua](http://www.lingua-mortua.tumblr.com)!

Hux tosses his beach towel over a lounger, urgently trying to get under the shade of the umbrella; he can already feel the hot singe of the sun on his delicate skin. Ben sets up beside him, wearing a pair of red swim trunks and a Massive Attack t-shirt. He reaches behind himself to tug at the collar and pull it off; Hux gapes a little at the unobstructed view of Ben’s muscular back—the dimples above the sloped curve of his ass, the tiny dark moles that dot his tan skin, the way his shoulders and lats and triceps flex—

“New guy!” Finn says from beside Hux, slapping a hand on Hux’s shoulder. Hux startles and looks at him, thankful Finn is one of the handful of people whose name he remembers. “Welcome to wedding, day two: adventure on the beach.” He laughs too loudly at his own joke and adds, “It’s like we’re in an Elvis movie! Do you surf?”

“I...no,” Hux admits. “I’m not a particularly strong swimmer. I brought a book.”

Finn turns his attention to Ben. “Benny, your boy here is a nerd.”

“Trust me,” Ben replies, carding his fingers through his hair and bunching it behind him, “I’m well aware.” He pulls at the tie on his wrist with his teeth and then puts his hair in a bun. Shirtless, the bright sun cascading over his form. Hux is suddenly in need of hydration.

“That’s why you love me, darling,” Hux says, fighting the urge to bite the thick pectorals offending his sight.

Ben glares at him, then tosses Hux a bottle of sunscreen and sits down on Hux’s lounger. “Mind getting my back... _ babe _ ?”

“Certainly,  _ honey _ ,” Hux replies.

“Okay well,” Finn says, “if you decide you wanna give it a try, let me know and I’ll have Poe give you some lessons.”

Ben’s back tenses. “I can teach  _ my boyfriend _ whatever he wants to know about surfing, Finn, thanks.”

Finn leans in and whispers to Hux, “Poe used to be a surf instructor.”

“ _ Finn _ ,” Ben hisses.

Finn backs away and adds, “Just saying.” Then, while Ben’s back is turned, he shakes his head and mouths,  _ Poe, definitely Poe _ , before running off.

Hux uncaps the sunscreen and squeezes some into his hand. He absently warms it in his palms, then slicks it across Ben’s shoulders. It takes him a moment to realize what he’s doing, that this is abnormal, that he’s not actually Ben’s boyfriend. But it doesn’t stop him from greedily rubbing his hands all over Ben’s back. His fingers ghost over roped muscles. He digs his thumbs into Ben’s shoulders a little, kneading out the knots of tension he knows he helped create.

Ben’s head drops forward as Hux works and he lets out a low moan. Hux glances up and sees Leia and Han setting up a few loungers down—Leia in a fashionable two-piece and a sun hat, Han trailing behind, completely out of place somehow in a Hawaiian shirt and swim trunks. 

Leia glances in their direction, so Hux climbs onto the lounger behind Ben, his knees on either side of Ben’s hips. He leans down and places a soft kiss below Ben’s ear, and doesn’t miss when a surprised exhale escapes his lips. He runs his hands under Ben’s arms and over his chest and stomach, whispering, “Is this amping it up enough for you?”

“No,” Ben replies, his voice rougher than it would otherwise be, and turns his head to catch Hux’s lips with his own.

The kiss is better than last night’s because this time Hux is stone-cold sober for it. He maps Ben’s mouth with his tongue so he can remember this when he’s back home, alone, pretending none of it ever happened. Kissing Ben is addictive in a way Hux never imagined given Ben’s atrocious habits of destroying straws and eating so unattractively. Hux hates himself for being so wrong about Ben for so long—how could he have missed this, how will he live without it once it’s gone—

Hux forces himself to pull away—erections and swim trunks don’t pair well together. 

“Do you really know how to surf?” he asks, forcing himself to think of anything but dragging Ben back to the hotel room and riding him until he’s sated—which, after this, he’s not sure he’ll ever be.

Ben huffs an arrogant laugh. The gesture belongs to that third persona Hux can’t quite place yet, the one who kisses him with such fervor it leaves Hux’s knees weak. “You’ll see.” 

***

Rey, Finn, Poe, and Ben spend the next several hours in the ocean, and Ben, Hux comes to find, appears to be an excellent surfer.

It’s all a bit surreal. Hux spends nine hours a day, five days a week within feet of Ben Solo, yet he’s learned more about him in the past three days than he has in the better part of a decade. Moments like this—when Hux has his book open but can only watch Ben lie flat on his stomach on his surfboard, laughing with Rey as they wait out another wave—make Hux wonder if he’s fallen asleep at his desk. Perhaps this is some kind of strange, lucid dream. He’ll wake up and have five emails waiting for him and an instant message from Ben that reads,  _ Wake up. Phasma’s making her rounds. _

Hux feels like he’s been turned upside down and shaken free of contents. 

The vibration of Hux’s phone pulls his attention away from Ben—a number he recognizes as one of the headhunters who won’t leave him alone. A renewed sense of dread washes over him when he remembers that he’ll have to go home soon, where not only will he be single again, he’ll have to face Phasma and Human Resources with whatever bullshit they plan to put on him. 

Before he can despair about it too long, Leia takes a seat on Ben’s lounger beside him and says, “Benny mentioned you were addicted to that thing.”

“That’s rich coming from a man with an emotional attachment to his Nintendo 64.”

Leia snorts a laugh and that’s when Hux remembers he has to attempt some semblance of tact. “If I had any idea what that thing would mean to him, I would never have bought it.”

In the distance, Rey and Ben have caught a wave and they're riding it in. Finn and Poe are on the shore, lobbing a volleyball back and forth. Leia watches them a long moment and adds, “That Poe is one hell of a guy.” Hux tries not to focus on Poe’s dark, broad shoulders, the dusting of hair on his stomach. Leia catches him staring anyway and lifts her sunglasses to see him better. “He’s single, you know.”

“Good for him,” Hux replies.

“Did two tours to pay for his college education. Now he’s a middle school social studies teacher.”

Hux can only take so much. He closes his book and levels a glare at Leia. “I’m sure he’s a catch, but I assure you, Ms. Organa, I am committed to your son.” He doesn’t let himself dwell on the surprising honesty of that statement.

Leia laughs in disbelief. “Is that so?”

“It is. I love Ben very much.” Nope, not going to touch that one. 

Leia leans toward Hux and says in a conspiratorial whisper, “I hate to break this to you—you do seem like a really nice boy, Hux—but my son is using you to piss me off.”

Hux leans toward her and whispers back, “Is it working?”

“No.”

“Then we’ll try harder.”

A huge loping figure rushes toward him in his peripheral vision. Oh fuck. Hux has approximately a half-second of awareness, just enough time to ask, “What are you—” before Ben picks him up bodily and throws him over his shoulder.

“Quit being boring!” Ben shouts behind him, soaking wet and apparently able to pick Hux up like he doesn’t weigh anything at all. 

Hux struggles in Ben’s grip as they run back toward the ocean. “Put me down, Benjamin!” he shouts. “I swear to god, I’ll—”

But Hux can’t finish his sentiment, because Ben tosses him in the water, and everything Hux had planned to say is muted by floundering. Saltwater overcomes his senses, and it takes him a long moment before he treads water comfortably, wiping it out of his eyes and running a hand through his soaked hair. He’s grateful he’d taken all of his electronics out of his pockets.

Ben swims in a circle around him, laughing, bright and delighted. 

“ _ So _ glad you’re finally having a good time,” Hux says. It comes out sarcastic but he doesn’t actually mean it that way.

“You ready to surf yet?” Ben asks, settling in front of Hux and wrapping his arms around his middle. Hux relaxes a little in Ben’s embrace, less scared of going under now that Ben has hold of him.

“I’d rather get stung by a jellyfish and have you piss on me.” Hux instinctively wraps his arms around Ben’s neck, his legs around his waist. He used to do this with an old boyfriend who had a pool in his backyard. Hux pretended he didn’t know how to swim so his boyfriend would carry him around. They made out like that for hours, rutting against each other in the deep end, under the diving board where no one could see them.

“That can be arranged.” Beads of water are caught in Ben’s long eyelashes. Dimples dot either side of his face, which Hux had been vaguely aware of before, but now that they’re so close, he realizes he should have paid more attention to them, worked harder to make Ben smile so he could see them. The ocean is sun-warm and filled with people. Waves push them away from the shore, but Ben pulls them back before they get too far.

“Your mother hates me,” Hux says. As casually as he can manage with his heart pounding in his chest, he lies, “And she’s watching.”

“Is she?” Ben asks, a smug smile accentuating his dimples.

Hux glances toward the beach and puts a hand over his brow. “Yes, she looks furious, too.”

“Hmm,” Ben replies. “We better do something about that.”

“Oh definitely. But what could we possibly do?”

Ben threads his fingers through Hux’s hair and pulls him in for another kiss. His lips are cool and salty from the water, but his mouth is warm as Hux licks into it. He’s weightless in the water, weightless for the first time in years.

***

Ben carelessly tosses his wet towel on the bed, staring at his phone.

Hux glares at him even though he doesn’t notice. He’s tempted to make a pithy remark, but Ben is typing away and wouldn’t hear him anyway. So Hux sighs and dramatically grabs the towel from the bed, taking it with him into the bathroom.

As he hangs it over the shower curtain, Ben tells him, “We’re meeting Finn and Rey downstairs in an hour.”

“For what?”

“The bachelor party.”

Hux scowls—the thought of being surrounded by clothed men surrounded by naked women is not entirely appealing to him. Then it occurs to him: “Why is Rey coming?”

“It’s also a bachelorette party.”

Hux pops his head out of the bathroom. His swim trunks have mostly dried, but his calves and ankles and between his toes are still caked with sand; his entire body feels grimy from the ocean. Ben doesn’t appear to have the same problem. If anything, the pink brush of sun on his nose and shoulders and his damp windswept hair look more like his natural state than a dress shirt and tie. Maybe he should have been a fish. “That doesn’t make sense.”

Ben clicks a few buttons on his phone and groans in frustration. “My mom wants to talk.” He plugs it into the charger by the bed, and Hux openly tracks the simple grace of his muscles as they move. Normally he’d look away, but his view isn’t going to last, so he’s taking it in while he still can. “I’ll be back later.”

Before Ben can make it to the door, Hux asks, his heart in his throat, “A kiss for the road, darling?”

Ben stops, and for a brief moment, Hux thinks he might laugh, or worse, roll his eyes and leave. Instead, a dark look crosses his face, the flicker of a smile. 

Being pinned under Ben’s hard stare makes Hux go a little stupid. “She can read your mind, can’t she? You might as well keep some interesting thoughts at the front of your—” But there’s no need, because Ben is in his space, tilting his chin up and kissing him again. 

It grows heated this time, hidden away from prying eyes. Ben bites at Hux’s bottom lip; Hux digs his fingers into Ben’s hips. Ben backs Hux against a wall—they’re nearly the same height, but Ben makes Hux feel small, all that massive strength and surprising athleticism laser-focused on him. Hux wonders what kind of ridiculous justification he’d have to spout to get Ben to throw him on the bed—sand be damned—and fuck him stupid, but right now there’s nothing in his brain but white noise anyway. He tries not to let go of the cracked moan edging its way from his throat, but fails. It comes out a desperate whimper that shows his cards. In response, Ben kisses him deeper, faster; Hux is bordering on losing control of himself—

Ben pulls away first, panting, eyes closed while he rests his forehead against Hux’s. “That’s…”

“Practice,” Hux says, similarly breathless. “Good...good practice.”

Ben lets out a little laugh and takes a reluctant step back. It takes all of Hux’s willpower not to follow, not to close the gap between them and let them do whatever their bodies want them to, propriety and work relationships and sort-of friendships left to deal with later.

“Gotta go talk to my mom,” Ben says, inching toward the door. “You really did a number on her. She’s pissed.”

“Mission accomplished then,” Hux replies, weaker than he intended. He grips the counter to remain upright.

Ben laughs in that awkward way he does sometimes which Hux has always found irritating but at the moment is nothing but completely endearing. Then he finally makes it out the door.

***

Hux showers and dresses, and Ben still hasn’t returned. He checks his phone to find a voicemail from an unidentified number and a handful of work emails he doesn’t want to bother with. He listens to the voicemail:

“Yes, this message is for Brendol Hux. My name is Margaret Steinwell and I’m with Dagobah Industries. I received your resume last week and was hoping we could set up a time to meet. You can give me a call back at—”

She rattles off her number, thanks Hux for his time, and hangs up. Hux stares at his phone, baffled. Dagobah is a small, reputable company—not the type to use headhunters at all. 

He pockets his phone, setting the voicemail aside for future-Hux to deal with, and busies himself with tidying up the hotel room—Ben insists on no housecleaning, the paranoid bastard—and finds the ice in the bucket has melted. He slips on his loafers, still gritty with sand, and ventures down the hallway to retrieve more ice.

Before he turns the corner to the vending area, he hears Leia and stops.

“—not two months ago you were telling me how much you can’t stand him.”

A number of ideas cross Hux’s mind—she could be talking to anyone, about anyone—but an instinctual pit of dread wells in his gut regardless, confirmed when Ben replies, “Things changed.”

“Did you honestly think I wouldn’t notice that you’re now  _ dating _ the same man you’ve been trying to get fired for the past six months?” Leia asks.

“I’m not trying to get him fired, Mom. I’m trying to—” Ben pauses and lowers his voice. “I’m trying to get him a new job.”

“Because you hate him. He teases you. He hurts your feelings. He makes you miserable. I’ve been listening to you complain about him every day for five years. You can’t expect me to believe all of that changed in the past month and now you’re madly in love.” Another pause, now softer: “I just want you to be happy. This Hux guy has never made you happy.”

Hux clutches the empty bucket of ice to his chest and leans against the wall. He closes his eyes and waits for Ben to refute it, to say anything at all, to tell his mother she’s wrong, she misunderstood—

When Ben says nothing, Leia adds, consoling, “I don’t know why you’re doing this, Benny. And I’m not going to ask for an explanation. But I need you to drop the act and start to help out a little. I’m in over my head here and I need an extra set of hands, okay?”

“Okay,” Ben relents. 

Hux hears clothes shuffling, probably a hug. Leia says, “You know I love you.”

But Hux is stalking back down the hall before Ben can say it back, like he’s done at the end of every phone conversation Hux has overheard throughout the entire time they’ve known each other.

He makes it back to the hotel room moments before Ben does, just enough time to toss the ice bucket aside and open his laptop at the little corner desk to pretend he’s getting work done. 

Ben returns moments later, and Hux is expecting him to say,  _ The jig is up.  _ Not that he’d ever say something like  _ jig _ , but Hux isn’t really thinking straight.

“You know it’s after hours back home,” Ben says instead, and even though he means  _ home _ as in Chicago, Hux can’t help but think of  _ home _ as in a smaller, shared place. A place that will never exist. “Nobody’s online.”

Hux forces his voice to steadiness as he says, “I know. I just don’t want to get behind on emails.”

“I could toss you in the ocean again. That seemed to help your last streak of boring.”

“That won’t be necessary,” Hux quips. 

“Whoa,” Ben says, falling back on the bed. Hux can’t focus on the words in front of him. “What crawled up your ass and died?”

Hux half-forms a thought about Ben’s heart and already being dead, but instead replies, “We’re to meet your family downstairs in twenty minutes. You best get ready. And don’t lie on the bed covered in oceanic filth. It’s bad enough you won’t allow housekeeping; don’t drag me into your germ-infested sandbox with you.”

“Fine, jesus.” The bedsprings groan as Ben stands up again and trudges to the bathroom. “You’ve been so chill lately I forgot you were like this.”

The bathroom door closes and Hux slams his laptop shut, falling back against the chair. He closes his eyes and imagines he’s at work, Ben behind him tapping away with his uncoordinated, arrhythmic typing. A phone ringing and Ben picking it up, chatting with one of his clients. He’s not a particularly good salesman in the traditional sense, but his earnestness makes him subversive. People don’t even know they’ve been sold until it’s already happened—it is, admittedly, a marvel to observe.

Hux wants that back, his easy admiration of Ben hidden underneath layers of open disdain. He thought Ben was smart enough to see through all that, to understand it for the affection it really is. This is why Hux is alone, though: he pushes people away. Just like he pushed his parents away, his ex-boyfriends. He doesn’t even try to make friends anymore. That had been the nice thing about Ben—they aren’t friends, not really. They’re coworkers. Cube mates. Forced into each other’s company instead of ever gravitating toward one another voluntarily. 

It had been absurd of him to ever think they were anything more. That this...vacation was anything but a facade, Hux using Ben for a free vacation, Ben using Hux to rustle feathers and get out of wedding duty. And now Hux can finally put it all together: he’s usually the one to invite Ben to lunch, to initiate conversation. It’s always Hux butting in on Ben’s phone conversations, Hux teasing and taunting him without Ben doing anything to retaliate. And it’s always Ben who hints at having a hard time saying no to people. Hux never bothers listening to him, though. That’s why Ben would rather drag someone he doesn’t like to the other side of the planet than say  _ I don’t want anything to do with this wedding _ . He can complain all he likes, but Hux has never heard him say no to anyone. Which is how they got handed an enormous project neither of them could handle and which probably led to this series of ridiculous events.

Hux remembers the exact moment Ben probably decided to get him sacked: working late one night, papers spread across an entire conference table, their project presentation looming the coming day. Hux had been exhausted, starving, frustrated. Ben was being obstinate about something, Hux can’t remember what. And Hux snapped. He called Ben a pity-hire, plucked directly from undergrad without any prior work experience in order to fill a quota of new bodies. He called Ben out for his poor work ethic, his lack of diligence and focus. His straight-C GPA. Worse, he told Ben he would never get promoted or hired elsewhere, which in retrospect is probably the reason Ben has been trying to find Hux a new job instead of just finding one himself—he either genuinely can’t, or he believes he can’t.

Hux reaches over to the mini-fridge and pulls out a tiny bottle of Jack. He uncaps it and downs it in one long swig.

***

An hour later, as promised, Finn and Rey are waiting in the lobby along with Poe and a handful of other younger people Hux doesn’t recognize. Finn and Rey dance together to the beat of the ukelele music that plays non-stop in every building within five miles. Hux hasn’t been to a club in years, but he’s thankful he packed a black dress shirt just in case. Ben is wearing his usual attire: a Black Rebel Motorcycle Club t-shirt and jeans, hair still wet from his shower.

Rey’s face lights up and she waves when she sees them—with her heels, she’s nearly as tall as Hux. “Are we all here now?” she asks, and counts heads. Satisfied, she adds, “We’re headed to Addiction in Ala Moana. I’ve arranged a shuttle to take us there, but you’re on your own getting back. I have a cab number if you need it.”

Hux spots Poe beside Finn, one hand in the pocket of his jeans and the other clicking around on his phone. Before, Hux hadn’t allowed himself a decent look, but now he lets his gaze wander. Poe has impeccable style—a fitted vest and a crisp shirt with the sleeves rolled up, hair neatly styled as it had been at dinner the prior evening. Ben never spoke much of him, just that they were something of nemeses, but now Hux can put a face to a concept, and he likes what he sees.

Poe looks up from his phone and catches Hux staring. Hux doesn’t look away, and Poe’s lips slide into a small smile. 

“All right, team! Fall out!” Rey says, and ushers everyone to the shuttle.

***

In the shuttle, Hux is squished between Ben and Poe, his knees touching both of theirs. He hasn’t figured out what to do about Ben, so he’s treating it like he treats all his problems in life: by ignoring it completely. Most everyone is chatting animatedly, and eventually Poe leans over a little and says to Hux, “So Benny tells me you two work together.”

“No I didn’t,” Ben quips, attention trained on his phone.

Hux brushes it off and replies to Poe, “We do, yes.”

“He’s never told me what it is you do, exactly.”

Ben mutters, “You never asked.”

“We sell commercial office equipment,” Hux supplies.

Poe’s eyebrows raise in polite engagement. “That sounds interesting.”

“It’s not,” Ben interjects.

“It  _ is _ ,” Hux says, irritation threaded through his words, “if that’s what you decide to make of it.”

Ben doesn’t take the bait. Poe sidesteps the tension and asks, “So you came all the way to the States to sell office equipment, huh?”

Hux laughs lightly. “No, I came here to go to Northeastern.”

“Chicago State here. Where you from originally?”

“Birmingham.”

Ben looks up from his phone. “I didn’t know that.”

“You never asked,” Hux repeats to him. He turns his attention back to Poe. “I hear you’re a social studies teacher. What’s that like?”

Ben makes a small irritated noise that only Hux seems to hear. Poe’s face lights up as he starts talking about his students. 

***

Predictably, Addiction is loud and packed and there are too many flashing lights for Hux’s taste. Unpredictably, Rey had reserved a small VIP area with their own bartender, so it’s manageable. In the darkness, he loses track of their entire party relatively quickly, but it doesn’t matter, because Poe has him enrapt in discussion. 

Hux finds him to be an engaging conversationalist in all the ways Ben isn’t: Poe asks questions, Ben usually pretends he isn’t listening; Poe laughs at Hux’s jokes, Ben tells Hux how stupid he is; Poe replies thoughtfully, Ben just changes the topic back to himself. 

Hux buys himself his first two drinks, but after that they somehow continue ending up in his hand. Poe might be buying them for him. Or maybe Ben. Hux looks around and can’t find Ben anywhere, so maybe not Ben. He swore Ben had been sitting beside him a moment ago, probably pouting because he’d rather be in the hotel room or on the beach. Hux and Poe are alone in the little lounge area, everyone else presumably on the dance floor, though Hux can’t really imagine Ben dancing. He wants to see it for himself, but not as much as he wants to keep talking to Poe.

Poe is sitting close, their thighs touching, lips periodically brushing against ears as they lean into each other to talk over the music. Poe smells like a touch of cologne, which isn’t usually Hux’s thing—he prefers people to just smell like they smell—but it suits him anyway. Hux tells Poe about college, about his cat, a little about his family but not much, still more than he’s ever told Ben because Ben never seemed interested. But mostly he listens: Poe talks about his tours, his classroom, being a pilot and saving up to buy a small plane. 

Finally Hux asks, “So what is it between you and Ben...ny?” He looks down at his drink to find it full again.

Poe laughs, and Hux is beginning to really like that sound. “He hasn’t told you?”

Hux shakes his head.

“If he hasn’t, then I’m sorry to say it isn’t my place. Your turn though: are you two really…you know…” He makes a circular hand gesture for Hux to fill in the blank.

Hux raises his eyebrows and takes a long swig of his drink. It’s something fruity, and the thought makes him giggle, because he considers himself fruity too. 

“What?” Poe asks, grinning. 

“Nothing,” Hux replies. “It’s just…” He looks around. They’re alone, but he leans in anyway and whispers in Poe’s ear, “We’re not.”

Poe leans back in shock. “For real?”

Hux cracks up and nearly spills his drink. “He can’t stand me. I just wanted a free vacation and he wanted to, I don’t know, prove he could get a date I guess. Piss you off, maybe. Piss off everyone. You know how he is.”

“Well I’ll be damned.”

“Poe  _ Damn _ -eron,” Hux says, laughing at his own joke. 

Poe is still grinning, perfect white smile mesmerizing. “You know you’re cute when you’re drunk.”

“Excuse you. I’m cute all the time.” And that’s how Hux knows he’s drunk: he says nice things about himself instead of mean ones.

Poe bites his lip and says, “Yeah, you’re that too.”

Hux stops laughing.

Poe takes Hux’s drink from his hand and sets it on the table in front of them, then shifts closer, putting an arm around the back of the seat. His eyes flicker to Hux’s lips. Hux has to cross his eyes to see Poe properly, all dark, handsome features and good-boy charm. He’s the kind of guy Hux would admire from afar but never have the guts to talk to; his heart flutters a little.

Poe takes Hux by the chin and says, “I’m gonna kiss you now, okay?”

“Okay,” Hux replies, awed.  

Poe presses their lips together, gentle, his scruff scratching against Hux’s skin in a way that sends a shiver down his spine. Hux doesn’t want to think about Ben, doesn’t want to compare, but he can’t help it—where Ben is hard and demanding, Poe kisses softly, nearly reverent.

Hux loses himself in the kiss, lets his mind slip into blissful nothingness. It lasts ages, Hux’s drunken perspective of time skewed against reality.

That is, until Ben says, “What the  _ fuck, _ Poe?”


	4. Chapter 4

It all happens in a blur. One moment, Hux is making out with a dashingly handsome Guatemalan social studies teacher who appears to be somewhat romantically inclined toward him. The next, he’s here: in the parking lot of a popular club in Honolulu, watching his coworker and the aforementioned teacher beat the shit out of each other.

Hux should be doing something. He knows he should be doing something. But for the life of him, he’s never imagined a point in his life where two men would fight over him, so all he can manage is standing around, dumbfounded, while Poe grunts things like, “Get your shit together, Benny! Quit pulling this crap!” 

And Rey shouts, “Stop it, you two! This is my goddamn  _ wedding _ you’re ruining!” She hits Ben’s back repeatedly with her clutch purse in a drunken effort to get them to stop.

And Finn rushes out of the club to break up the fight, inching out of the way of a swinging fist just in time to save him from getting his nose broken. Now Rey is shouting at her fiancee to stay out of it, and Poe is shouting at both of them to stay out of it, and Ben is grappling Poe to the ground.

“I thought you grew out of this, you fucking dweeb,” Poe grits out. He has Ben in something of a half-nelson, which Ben twists out of easily—which leads Hux to believe they've done this often—but then Ben opens himself to flying elbow to the facial region. 

Despite the sickening crack it makes, the resulting pain doesn’t appear to deter him, nor the already-blossoming bruise on his cheekbone. “I’ll stop when you stop pulling this shit on me.”

“It’s nothing like last time!” Poe says.

“The fuck it isn’t,” Ben spits out, on his back with Poe straddling him, and blocks a right hook with his forearm. “He’s  _ my _ boyfriend.”

Which is when Hux finally intervenes: “You’re not my boyfriend, Ben.”

He doesn’t even say it particularly loudly, yet that’s all it takes to capture Ben’s attention—staring at Hux wide-eyed, shocked, enraged, hurt—long enough to miss dodging an uppercut Poe throws to his jaw. His head slams back into the pavement. Lights out.

“Ah shit,” Poe says, standing and shaking his hand. “I didn’t mean to do that.”

“He’s had worse,” Finn adds. 

“He’ll be pissed when he wakes up,” Rey says. The three of them look down at him, not with concern, but exasperation. Hux wonders if all Ben’s crazy stories about his youth are actually true, that even his family and best friends can’t be plussed when he gets KO’d anymore. Rey turns an angry glare at Hux. “Is it true?”

Hux feels an ugly ball of dread well in his stomach. He grips his cell phone in his pocket so tightly it might break. “We’re just coworkers. We’ve never even hung out outside of work.” He pauses, and it physically pains him now that he’s sober enough to admit, “He hates me.”

Hux doesn’t know Rey very well, but the stunned betrayal that crosses her face is enough to make him want to crawl under the pavement and never see the light of day. “So you, what, wanted a free vacation? A trip to Honolulu on my family’s dime? Manipulate me into believing my cousin finally found someone nice to settle down with?” Hux can’t meet her eyes. Her voice cracks when she says, “Why? Why would you do that to me? To us?”

A lump wells in Hux’s throat. He finds himself unable to respond, to do anything but stare at Ben’s unconscious, battered form. 

Rey turns her attention to Poe. “And you.” She hits him with her purse to emphasize each word: “Why. Would. You. Do. This.” She pushes him and he stumbles back, hands protecting his face,  _ “Again?” _

“Guys,” Finn interrupts. “Let’s just get a cab and call it a night, okay? We have all day tomorrow to deal with this. Sober. Like adults.”

It calms Rey enough that she stops assaulting Poe with her purse, shoulders dropping. “Fine,” she says, opening it and pulling out her phone, “but I swear to god if either of you—” She points her phone at Poe and then Hux, “—do anything else to sabotage this wedding, I will cancel your reservations and fly you home early.”

***

Ben comes to in the back of the cab. Although all four of them had been reluctant to ride with him, Hux drew the short straw, having no prior history with Ben’s anger. The other three rode separately.

_ Welcome to the family _ , Rey had said with a sarcastic sneer as she closed the cab door, sealing Hux in with his fate. 

Ben groans and mutters, “Where’s Mom?”

“Asleep, I imagine,” Hux says, staring out the window, palm trees and neon-lit storefronts passing by. “It’s late.”

“Oh,” Ben replies. He wipes his chin with the back of his hand and it comes away bloody, his lip having been busted by Poe’s knuckles. “Fuck.”

Hux, still tipsy, can't keep back the spite in his words as he says, “Anyway, it’s not like she can un-beat you to a pulp.”

And maybe Ben is still not-entirely-conscious, because he pouts and sounds all of five years old when he says, “She kisses it better.” 

“She can’t kiss getting kicked out of Addiction better, Ben.”

“Quit calling me that.”

“Ben? That’s your name.”

“But it’s not what  _ you _ call  _ me _ ," then adds,  muttered, “You always call me Benjamin.”

It’s a testament to how little Ben cares for him that he insists Hux call him by his formal name. He thought they were beyond that, but he supposes he’s misinterpreted their entire relationship.

“So why’d you do it?” Ben asks quietly, his forehead resting against the window, eyes closed. Hux isn’t sure if he means coming clean about their lack of relationship or kissing Poe.

Regardless, he’d rather stand defenseless against Phasma's clipped vitriol in front of a dozen peers than endure this conversation. “We’re not talking about this while I’m drunk and you’re concussed.”

“Then when?” 

“Hopefully never.” It slips out, but as he says it, Hux can envision getting back home, quitting his job after having taken one of the myriad of job offers awaiting him. He can forget about Ben and his clusterfuck of family drama and go back to his peaceful existence, once more completely alone. 

“Fine,” Ben says, and wipes the renewed trail of blood on his chin with his shirt sleeve.

***

“Don’t touch me,” Ben hisses, swatting Hux’s hand away when Hux tries to take a wet washcloth to Ben’s bloodied neck. 

“You’re lacking the necessary number of hands to clean yourself up and hold an ice pack to your face at the same time,” Hux bites back, “so sit the hell down and let me do this.”

Ben slumps down onto the closed toilet lid. His injuries looked worse in the dark: his lip has stopped bleeding but began swelling, exacerbating his perpetual pout. A dark purple bruise blossoms on the side of his face near his cheek, and the skin has split at his cheekbone. Scrapes dot his chin and elbows. Hux never got into much trouble as a child, but if he had, he imagines this is what it would have looked like. 

“I can do it myself,” Ben mumbles. It is astounding that a nearly thirty-year-old man, when he doesn't get his way, can so effortlessly sound like a toddler.

“Says the man who regained consciousness and immediately asked for his mommy.” Hux takes an alcohol wipe from his dopp kit and wipes it across the cut on Ben’s cheek.

Ben hisses in pain and grimaces. “It’s not the first time this has happened. It probably won’t be the last.”

“Why don’t you start with the first,” Hux says, more a demand than a question, even though he doesn’t know why Ben should tell him anything.

“I don’t know why I should tell you anything.”

“Oh, grow up.”

Ben pouts—or maybe it’s just the weight of his fat lip—and waits several long moments before replying, “Poe never stole my prom date.”

“What?” Hux asks, hand hovering near Ben’s cheek.

“Poe  _ was _ my prom date. And someone else stole him.” Ben swallows hard and doesn’t meet Hux’s eyes. “But it was my fault.”

“What is:  _five words I never thought I'd hear Ben say_. I'll take Ben Solo's Homoerotic Childhood for eight hundred, Alex.”

Ben ignores him and continues, “It was always the four of us growing up, Rey, Finn, Poe, and me. Rey and Finn went to prom together, obviously, and so it only made sense that Poe and I go together. It was supposed to be a joke. I mean, it wasn’t, but it was.”

“Is that the concussion talking or did you manage to create a parallel universe?”

Ben glares at him. “Can you cap the sass for like five seconds? I’m trying to tell you something.”

Hux finishes doctoring Ben’s face and tosses the alcohol wipe away, leaning against the sink and biting his tongue from saying anything more.

“Poe wasn’t out at the time, at least not to me. Maybe I should have just known, I don’t know. Paid more attention. We do the whole prom thing, dinner, dance formalities, stupid picture, party hopping. We end up at someone’s house. Everyone is trashed. Next thing I know, I’m opening doors trying to find a bathroom, and Poe is making out with some asshole named Jake and—fuck, I just lost it.” 

“Because you had a crush on Poe, or you didn’t know he was gay, or…?”

“I don’t know. I didn’t handle stuff well back then—”

“Good to know some things never change.” Bitterness seeps into Hux’s tone, masking the slow suturing of the now-obvious picture that Ben still has feelings for Poe, hidden as they may be. 

Ben lowers his ice pack and stands, crowding Hux against the sink. For as much as Hux daydreams about the benefits of Ben’s size, he’d never before considered the downfalls. The downfalls being: he’s terrifying. “Fuck you, Hux. We were doing fine until you got trashed and blew our cover.” A flicker of a moment passes when Hux thinks Ben might clock him, but instead he tosses the ice pack in the sink and leaves the bathroom.

“Where are you going?” Hux asks, cursing himself for the urgency in his voice.

“My parents have a suite. I’m going to go sleep on their roll-out.”

Before Hux can remind him not to fall asleep with a concussion, Ben leaves the room.

***

Hux’s blaring phone wakes him up the next morning, inciting the dormant throbbing of his imminent hangover. He doesn’t look at it before answering, and immediately regrets it.

“Mmm?” he asks in lieu of a greeting.

“You have two options,” Leia says. “You get your pasty ass down here and help, or I fly you the hell home.”

Hux sits up in bed and pinches the bridge of his nose. His brain pounds against his skull in an attempt to escape. “How’s Ben?”

Leia scoffs. “Beat all to hell, no thanks to you. Trust me, I’m more than happy to fork out the cash to get you as far away from my family as possible, but I also need all hands on deck. Are you in or not?”

“Give me an hour.”

“You have half that,” Leia says, and hangs up.

***

Hux is grateful the reception venue is attached to the hotel lobby. Despite the tropical climate, he can avoid the sun and its bright rays piercing his cranium. He nearly cries with relief when he sees a carafe waiting for him and a small buffet table of pastries and fruits and juices. Ben had once told him,  _ Leia fucking Organa whole-asses everything _ . Hux didn’t believe it until this very moment.

He fills his empty stomach with pineapple and a muffin he can’t tell the flavor of because he eats it too fast, then nearly scalds his tongue gulping down his coffee.

“How you feeling?” comes a voice beside him, and Hux nearly chokes.

Only Poe Dameron would ask Hux how he’s feeling after a night like last night. Everyone else has been giving Hux dirty looks, which he doesn’t think is entirely fair because he has no idea who any of them are, yet everyone seems to know him. And, apparently, his newfound reputation as a liar and cheat. Also not fair, considering he once called the ethics department on himself when a pornagraphic picture popped up on his work computer. Hux has never considered himself a good man, but he’d always been an honest one, until now.

Poe smiles shyly—the first apprehensive gesture Hux has seen of him—mostly unscathed but for a ruddy bruise beside his mouth, hidden under his perpetual layer of stubble. 

“I’m fine,” Hux says, even though he’s the furthest from it. “You?”

Poe lets out another one of his charming laughs with a crooked smile, unencumbered by the bruise. No wonder Ben’s head over heels for him. “Been better, you know?”

Hux saves himself the trouble of replying by taking another sip of coffee. They watch the bustling activity of the banquet hall, employers and family members alike setting up for tomorrow’s event. Leia stands near the front of the room, directing traffic with a clipboard in hand, looking more like a conductor than a matron. Hux is grateful she hasn’t spotted him yet, though he’s plagued with concern that Ben is nowhere to be found. Were this any other situation, Hux would call him and tease him for being spoiled rotten, not having to do any work because  _ wittle Benny got hurt _ .

But this is not any other situation, and Hux can’t brush it off with his tactless wit. 

“Ben told me,” Hux admits to Poe. He swallows another gulp of coffee in an effort to sound more casual. “About you two, I mean.”

“Shit,” Poe replies, running a hand through his hair. “I didn’t know you didn’t know.”

“To be fair, I didn’t know I didn’t know either.”

“I guess you wouldn’t, not really being together and all.” 

In the distance, Leia shouts at Han walking into the room with a box in hand—“That’s not where those go!”—shadowed by Uncle Chewie, both of whom turn on their heels and walk back the direction they came.

“So I guess that means we should…” Poe begins, scratching the back of his neck.

“Of course,” Hux says. “It’s probably best to avoid further trouble.”

“Yeah.” Poe nods and starts walking away, then stops and adds, “But you know, if things don’t work out, we could keep in touch, yeah?”

“Sure,” Hux says out of gut-instinct politeness. He doesn’t have much interest in being kept on Poe’s backburner in case his relationship with Hux’s ex-fake-boyfriend doesn’t work out. Yet another thing about today that’s just dreadfully unfair. 

***

Hux has no idea why he’s invited to the rehearsal, except maybe for Leia to torture him. She’s been bossing him around all day, everything from helping to set up the altar to picking up a gallon of guava juice for no discernible reason. This is by far the hardest he’s worked at anything since...probably ever.

The scene isn’t complete yet—the flowers for the altar have yet to arrive, too many people are mulling about on the beach who have no affiliation with the wedding party, rock music blares in the distance. But Rey and Finn are barefoot in the sand and practicing the Twist together while they wait for the minister to show up, smiling and laughing without a care. 

Hux slumps onto a white folding chair near the back, trying to stay as far out of Leia’s peripheral vision as he can manage. He feels a bit like a filthy voyeur, a stowaway, but before the dark tendrils of self-pitying thoughts make their way through him, he catches sight of Ben loping down the beach, headphones wrapped around his neck and wind whipping his hair against his still-battered face. Hux takes his phone out of his pocket and busies himself with it so he doesn’t have to live through the inevitable bubble of awkward tension when Ben approaches.

Though he’s not looking, he can feel Rey’s disdainful apprehension from feet away, but Finn manages to placate it with, “You look like someone shoved your face in a garbage disposal.”

Without missing a beat, Ben replies, “At least I’m tall enough to reach the sink.”

“Oh my god,” Rey says, and the tension has once again dissipated.

Hux risks a glance and finds Ben laughing with Finn and Rey, the over-emotional and expressive Benny haven taken over Hux’s shy, sullen Benjamin. Hux feels a kind of gaping emptiness at the thought, that he’d taken advantage of their physical proximity over the years and mistook it for intimacy, that he doesn’t really know Ben—Benny—at all. 

The minister finally arrives. Leia coaches everyone through how the ceremony is going to go. They all practice going down the aisle—first little Artie, the flower boy, six years old; then BeeBee, the ring-bearer, maybe three; followed by Lando and Uncle Chewie; then Rey’s friend Jessika with a stodgy fellow everyone calls Mr. Threepio. 

Out of breath, Poe runs down the hill from the hotel and says, “Sorry I’m late.”

It’s one of those indescribable moments of everyone being fully, consciously aware of the awkwardness of the moment, a mystical silence as everyone turns to look at Poe. Ben is waiting at the end of the aisle for him, still yet to acknowledge Hux’s existence. 

Ben and Poe look at each other, a long, knowing look that two people give who have been to hell and back at one another’s side and hold no hard feelings about it. Like  _ Fight Club _ , where violence begets intimacy, but to Hux’s knowledge no one is harboring Brad Pitt as a sociopathic alternate identity. Despite having beaten each other ragged not a day ago, Ben holds his elbow out, Poe loops his arm through it, and they walk past Hux down the aisle.

When Hux was younger, he once knew a boy who only pretended to be his friend so he could sit next to Hux, thereby being closer to the girl he liked. Hux, having never had many (any) friends, should have probably caught on sooner, should have probably been less hurt and felt less used by the ordeal. He feels something similar as Ben and Poe give each other a reluctant-albeit-fond smile before parting at the altar, Poe as best man on Finn’s side, and Ben as man of honor on Rey’s. 

It’s pretend, Hux thinks. It was pretend from the start. It was even Hux’s own, stupid idea, but for the life of him, he can’t remember why it seemed so important to him to come here. Hux can’t even listen to the eulogy—no, wrong word, whatever—because Ben is  _ right there _ , mere feet in front of him, and Hux can’t think of anything other than the way his lips felt, his body, his hands. It had seemed so  _ real _ . 

But it wasn’t. It isn’t.

Fuck Leia’s rules. If she wants to drop the cash to fly him home, let her. Hux stands and leaves the rehearsal. No one follows him.

***

Happy hour is a grand hour. Hux finds himself at a beachside bar throwing back Mai Tais as fast as the bartender can bring them. He watches a game of the sports on television, where one team throws or kicks or hits some sports at another team and points happen. It all seems very dramatic.

Wicker fans rotate slowly on the ceiling, a sweet ocean breeze coming in through the open space. Hux picks idly at the soggy white cocktail napkin and runs his thumb over the condensation on his glass. He doesn’t feel so raw anymore.

“Jesus, there you are,” Ben says from somewhere behind him, and a big hand grabs Hux by the bicep.

“Jesus? Is that what we’re calling me now?” When Hux swivels his head to look at Ben, the room spins with him. He tilts drastically on the barstool and nearly topples off of it, but Ben catches him and hauls him back up. “Bit of a promotion, don’t you think?” 

“C’mon, Mom’s pissed. We gotta go to dinner.” Ben makes eye contact with the bartender as he takes his wallet out of his back pocket. He slides a credit card across the bar.

Hux isn’t listening, hung up on the word  _ promotion _ . “Oh oh oh, speaking of, I meant to show you something.”

“Not now, Hux, Mom wants you to—”

But Hux is already fumbling with his phone. He puts it on speaker and plays the first voicemail.

A man’s voice, clipped, professional, inviting Hux to interview for a position selling truck bed liners. Hux laughs again; people are staring at him; Ben scribbles on the receipt, drops the pen, and begins pulling Hux by the elbow toward the beach.

“Truck beds! Why on earth would I be qualified to sell truck beds? It’s almost like someone forged my resume,” Hux says as he stumbles behind Ben, dragged along, kicking up sand as he walks. He lets his phone roll over to the next message. A woman’s voice this time, explaining what a  _ good fit _ Hux seems for their management training program. “This one specifically refers to my  _ management experience _ , which I find particularly interesting. Because I have none.”

“Knock it off, Hux,” Ben says behind him.

Hux digs his heels in the sand, literally and metaphorically, until Ben can no longer pull him. Ben stops and turns around, and even though he currently has several heads, all of them happen to look furious. At least he’s consistent.

The message rolls over. A woman again,  _ just touching base _ about a shift leader position at Target. 

“Target! Because physical interaction with other human beings is really my forte."

Ben lets out a frustrated groan and leans down, grabbing Hux by the thighs and lifting him over his shoulder. 

“What are you—stop it, Benjamin. Put me down!” Hux struggles and kicks, his phone messages still yammering on, beach patrons staring.

At the same time Ben shouts, “Turn your fucking phone off before I chuck it into the sea,” Hux tries to shout over him, “Put me down you fucking Dumbo-eared jackass, there’s no reason for me to be here anyway,” while Ben continues, “I swear to god, you’ve pulled a lot of stupid shit before, this was the worst decision of my—” and Hux yells, “None of this would be happening if you weren’t trying to get me fired!”

Ben stops walking.

“Put me the  _ fuck _ down, Benjamin!”

Ben does, none too gently, and Hux hits the sand with a thud. He stares down at Hux sprawled on the beach—dozens of people have their eyes on them, not a sound to be heard but the roaring of the early-evening ocean. “What did you say?”

“None of this, and I mean  _ none of it _ would have happened if you hadn’t been trying to get me fired. If I had known you found my presence  _ so  _ intolerable—”

Ben pales, eyes wide. “Who told you?”

“No one  _ told _ me,” Hux mutters, getting to his feet and brushing sand off of himself. “I overheard you talking to your mother.”

Ben’s voice rises an entire octave as he asks, “You heard that?”

“About how much you secretly loathe me and have been conspiring against me for months? Yes. Every word of it.”

“I can explain—” Ben begins.

But Hux is already walking the other direction, away from the hotel, away from the bar, away from Ben. “There’s nothing to explain. I have an HR inquisition when we get back—”

“ _ What? _ ” Ben asks, chasing after him.

“One of your recruiter pals had the gall to call our present employer for a reference. Phasma’s finally going to get the opportunity she’s been looking for. I assure you, I’ll be out of your life soon.”

“But—”

“It’s fine, Ben. Trust me when I say I understand.” Ben stops walking, mouth agape, and Hux waves clumsily at him. “Enjoy dinner. I’ll see you at the wedding.”


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you enjoyed the fic! Thanks for reading!!

Hux finds himself on the beach, watching the sunset, slowly and unfortunately sobering. His phone rings—Leia, probably wanting to berate him for not helping with the rehearsal dinner—and he turns it to silent before shoving it back into his pocket.

Minutes later, he hears footsteps approach, unconcerned given that most people are packing up for the day to head out to dinner. The line of beachside restaurants behind him are beginning their nightly hula serenades. Tiki torches pulse an orange glow across the rapidly darkening sea. The tide creeps up the sand, getting closer to Hux’s toes with every wave.

A figure sits next to him with a rasped grunt, and Hux does a bewildered double-take when he sees Han beside him.

“You couldn’t have gotten some chairs?” Han asks, passing over a beer.

Hux takes it. “I wasn’t expecting company.”

“Well we were, and you didn’t show.”

It’s such a surprisingly accusatory remark that despite what had heretofore been Han’s bumbling oafishness, Hux feels all of ten inches tall. No wonder Ben fights so much with his father, if the man is capable of so much with so few words. “I’m sorry.”

Han lets the accusatory silence settle between them. “You know, I’ve been listening to this battle from all sides since the minute we got here. It’s all anybody’s talking about.”

Hux wants to reply, but he can’t form a defense against what he knows is coming.

“It’s a damn shame is what it is,” Han adds. “We all get sucked into the drama of someone else’s non-relationship instead of celebrating the real one we all came here for. But I guess that was the intention.” He looks at Hux and smiles with a baffling combination of amusement and irritation.

Finally Hux manages, “With all due respect, Mr. Solo, if you came out here to give me a guilt trip, your wife has already beat you to the punch dozens of times over—”

“Do you always have a snappy comment for everything? Do you know when to shut up?”

Hux shuts his mouth.

“For the most part, you seem nice. No, that’s a lie, you seem like an asshole, but I know my son is kind of an asshole too, so while I believed it, I thought you two were a good match.”

“Thank you?” Hux asks.

“What I’m trying to tell you is that I know my son—”

“And I know—” Hux defends.

“Jesus, kid, what did I just say about shutting up?”

“Sorry,” Hux mutters, picking at the label of his beer bottle and squeezing his bare toes into the cold sand.

Han snorts a laugh, and for a moment, Hux can see the younger version of him, the scoundrel from all Ben’s outlandish stories, the man who could always talk his way out of a scuffle. “I know my son, and I know my wife. Ex-wife. Cohabitant. Whatever she’s calling us nowadays. They’re pretty much the same person, and that person is really fucking weird. Point is, I have no idea what’s going on. I never do. I never want to. But I do know that—” He pauses, collecting his thoughts. Hux gets the distinct impression no one ever lets him talk this long. “Ben, Leia, they both mean well, but they fuck things up more than they don’t, and trust me when I say all you can do is go along for the ride.”

“Well I’m getting a bit sea-sick, so I’d rather…” _Get off_ seems like a bad choice of words, so Hux concludes, “not. And anyway, your son hates me.”

“That’s the thing about the Organa-Skywalkers, kid.” Han clanks his bottle against Hux’s. “They always make you think that.”

***

Hux makes it back to the hotel room after dark and finds it predictably empty. When he flips on the light, Ben’s suitcase is gone, the small hurricane of clothes that had been bursting out of it creating an empty space on the carpet. Hux’s belongings haven’t been touched, like Ben had never been here at all.

The pad of hotel stationery catches Hux’s eye, Ben’s messy writing scrawled over it: _We need to talk._

Hux tears it off the pad and crumples it up, then tosses it in the bin on his way to faceplant onto the bed. Exhausted, he dozes off immediately.

Hours pass before he’s roused by the sound of a card sliding into the lock, a brief ray of light against his eyelids, and the click of the knob as it slides shut again. Hux doesn’t bother opening his eyes, but he can’t help the sudden racing of his heart.

He feels a dip in the bed, a hot drunken exhale against his neck. “We need to taaaaalk,” Ben says, muffled at an awkward angle between Hux’s shoulder and the pillow. His touch shouldn’t feel as familiar as it does.

“No,” Hux replies.

“You suck.”

“But I do it well.”

“I wouldn’t know.”

Hux sits up on his elbows, his hair in his face, a headache pulsing at his temples. “You’re drunk. There’s nothing to talk about. Go away.”

In the dark, Ben’s face looks fractionally less destroyed than the night prior, enough that Hux can tell the pout he’s giving is real and not a side effect of Poe’s fist. Hux sighs and tries to get up from the bed, but Ben wraps a massive arm around his middle and pulls him back.

“Not again, let me go—” Hux struggles and kicks at Ben’s shins with his heels, but Ben holds on tight and buries his face in the crook of Hux’s neck, aggressively snuggling him.

“But you’re so _tiny_ ,” Ben says, his lips ghosting over Hux’s skin in a way that tickles and makes him jerk. “I could crush you.”

“I am not _tiny_ , I’m—” Hux begins, but doesn’t have a way to finish his sentence that wouldn’t make him sound like a child.

“Yes you are, and you’re grumpy, and we’re gonna talk about this.”

Hux stops struggling and heaves a weary sigh.

“This is what my mom used to do to me when I got mad,” Ben says. “She’d hold me and make me talk about stuff until I felt better.”

“The only people I want to talk to right now are our Human Resources department so I can provide them my resignation and never speak to you again.”

“Is that what you really want?”

“Yes! And I want to go home, and most importantly…” He continues struggling. “I want you to _let go of me_.”

Ben lifts his arm and Hux’s momentum forces him to roll off the bed, landing hard on the scratchy carpeting and knocking the wind out of himself. Staring up at the ceiling, he asks, “Will you please stop doing that?”

Ben inches over the edge of the mattress, looking down at Hux’s prone form, tendrils of black hair falling around his face. “Why do you keep trying to run away?”

Hux gestures in exasperation. “You’re pushing me away! You jeopardized my _job_. My fucking livelihood. You dragged me to this godforsaken island just to make your ex jealous. I’m not your fucking plaything, Benjamin.”

“There are so many things wrong with what you just said, I don’t know where to start.”

Hux gives him a derisive snort and replies, “Right, like you can explain away secretly hating me all these years, conspiring against me, and getting into a physical altercation with the man you’re in love with—”

“The man I’m in love with is you.”

“—endangering yourself for the sake of, really, an unhealthy amount of jealousy—” Hux stops. He blinks. He reaches up to pinch the bridge of his nose and close his eyes. He didn’t hear that. He didn’t hear it and it didn’t happen and his heart isn’t pounding a mile a minute in his chest. He takes a deep, shuddering breath before asking, “What did you just say?”

Ben’s voice is pitiful, muffled in the mattress as he says, “I was jealous of Poe, not you. I wanted you to find a new job, a better job, so I could ask you out and if you rejected me it wouldn’t make things awkward.”

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” Hux says, more to himself than Ben. “This can’t be happening. This isn’t real. No one could be that dumb. That childish. That—”

“I am. All of those things. That’s why I thought you wouldn’t want to go out with me. Because I’m terrible.”

“But if _you’re_ a self-deprecating idiot, and _I’m_ a self-deprecating idiot, who’s steering the ship?”

“I’m not being down on myself; you tell me I’m terrible almost every day.”

Hux throws his arms up in frustration. The dramatic effect is stifled by his position on the floor. “I’m kidding!”

“It never sounds like it,” Ben mutters.

Hux glares at him. “So that’s what this is. Instead of just asking me to change my tone, or facing your crush on me like a goddamn adult, you fueled all that aggression into venting to mummy dearest and a plot to ruin my life.”

“Well when you put it like that—”

A wave of nausea passes over Hux, some horrific combination of shock and rage. “Please, Ben, just leave.”

“But—”

“Get out!”

Ben clamors off the bed with a huff. “You know all of this was your idea. And none of this would have happened if you just stuck to the original plan.”

Hux sits up to peer at Ben from over the mattress, funneling as much anger into his expression as he can despite being sprawled on a hotel floor. “If you had been honest with me in the first place, I never would have suggested the plan at all.”

Affronted, Ben asks, “Why?”

“Because you were right: if you had asked me out, I would have said no.”

Ben’s jaw drops, an expression of raw hurt flickering over his face, then clouding over into the blankness Hux is more accustomed to. “You know, for a while there I believed you _wanted_ to come here with me, that you were mean to me all the time because you liked me. But I get it. You were just using me, because that’s the kind of guy you are. Mom was right about you.”

Ben trudges across the hotel room and opens the door. Hux shouts after him, “You were the one using _me_ , Benjamin!” but he’s already gone.

***

Hux’s alarm goes off at an ungodly hour, but it doesn’t matter because he didn’t sleep. Around five in the morning, he gave up his fruitless attempts at rest, and left the hotel to pick up a coffee and sit on the beach. No one interrupts his moping this time around, no messages from Ben or interview calls. The beach is empty and silent save for the rhythmic crash of the tide on the sand and the occasional morning jogger running by.

Despite the tranquil morning, it offers no him no respite.

He clicks his alarm off, the same one that rouses him from sleep at home. It serves as an unconscious reminder of how often Ben is the first thing he thinks of when he wakes up. Half-asleep, too groggy to censor his own thoughts, he considers where they should go for lunch, what Ben is going to wear, what they should talk about, what he can do to make Ben laugh that day. And a non-thought, just a feeling: a giddy kind of excitement that he’ll get to see Ben soon, a subtle awareness that Ben’s company is going to be the highlight of his whole day. He hadn’t lied—if Ben had asked him out, he thinks, he would have said no.

And then he would have found a new job and said yes.

Hux stands, so accustomed now to sand that he doesn’t think to wipe it off as he trudges back to the hotel.

***

“We need an usher,” Leia says. The deafening static of wind crackles through the phone line.

Hux’s collar is popped, his tie threaded around his neck, and he’s running nearly an hour early. He pulls his phone away from his ear to stare at it in contempt before bringing it back. “I don’t see why that’s my problem.”

“Brendol Jeremiah Hux, don’t you use that tone with me.”

“You’re not my mother.”

“If I were, I’d have raised you better.” Somehow, Hux detects a reluctant fondness in her voice. Either she’s hit the mimosas early, or spending the better part of the past twenty-four immensely stressful hours with Hux has built a kind of camaraderie between them. Which is impossible, because no one has ever softened to him that quickly in his entire life.

“I don’t know which side anyone goes on.”

“I don’t want your excuses, Brendol. I want your cooperation. Meet you down here in ten minutes.”

Hux sighs. “I’ll be right there.”

***

The pre-ceremony whirlwind is utter chaos, Hux the lieutenant to Leia’s command. The flowers are late. Rey is upstairs screaming for Jessika, whom no one can locate. Salmon was supposed to be on the menu for the reception but there was some problem with a listeria outbreak. At some point, Hux received both a bluetooth and an iPad and has spent the better part of two hours trying to acquire a luau-style roast pig in lieu of the salmon, while simultaneously trying to contact the florist to get an ETA, and frantically texting Jessika on someone else’s phone.

Less than an hour before guests are set to begin arriving, the florist shows up and finishes the altar. Hux has finally located both a pig and Jessika, the former from a butcher in Ala Moana who had a lucky cancellation that day, the latter in her hotel room, asleep on the bathroom floor.

“Who the hell’re you?” Jessika slurs, blinking up at him from the white tile, hungover and thankfully fully dressed.

Hux notes that at least her aim was true and flushes the toilet, then pulls her gently to an upright position so that she’s leaning against the sink. “Your best friend’s cousin’s ex-fake-boyfriend.” He shoves a couple aspirin in her hand and a glass of water.

She squints at him. “What.”

“My name is Hux.”

“Oh yeah, I remember you. You were making out with Benny. And then Poe.” She takes the pills and drinks the water.

Hux gives her a reassuring smile that feels more like resentful sneer. “That would be me, yes.”

She nods her approval and says, “Dude. Awesome.”

He manages to coax her to the bridesmaids’ dressing room.

***

By the time the guests arrive, the chaotic afternoon has settled into a beautiful evening. Beach patrons give their allotted space a wide berth. Even the seagulls seem to be respectful of the upcoming ceremony. The wind is light, not a single cloud hovers in the sky, and everything is somehow, against all odds, perfect. An outdoor carpet is rolled out to keep the sand at bay. Dozens of white folding chairs line up on either side of the aisle. The altar stands in front of the ocean, decorated with orange and white hibiscus flowers and dotted with fairy lights.

Hux smiles at the first family to arrive before he realizes he’s still wearing the bluetooth. He pulls it off to shove in his pocket. “Bride or groom’s side?” he asks, handing them a program. He had no idea he'd feel such gratitude for being someone else’s lackey on vacation, but flipping his brain into salesman mode like he does at work is doing wonders for ignoring his present romantic crisis.

He manages to single-handedly seat all two-dozen guests within the span of about twenty minutes, and is just about to take his own seat when a cane cracks against his shins. He yelps and has to bite his lip to keep from shouting an expletive, then looks down to find a tiny, ancient woman staring up at him. Her glasses make her eyes take up her whole face; she must be nearly a thousand years old.

“Bride or groom’s side?” Hux asks, grimacing more than smiling.

Instead of answering, she prods at his stomach with her cane and peers suspiciously at him. ‘Who are you?”

“My name is Hux, I’m—”

“A troublemaker!” she hisses. “You’re the one causing all this hub-bub.”

Hux lowers his voice to keep the rest of the guests from staring at them. “And as you can see, I’m doing my best to make up for it.”

The old woman looks him up and down, critically appraising him. “I know you.” She straightens her glasses on her nose. “I _see_ you. And it’s going to take more than handing out little pamphlets to fix my Benny’s heart.”

Hux grits his teeth and tries to hand her a program. “Will you please just tell me—”

She pushes his hand away and lifts her chin, walking past him to seat herself in the first row on Rey’s side.

***

Once the guests have all arrived, Leia and Han rush down the hill, Leia in a flattering flowy dress and Han in a rumpled grey suit and backwards tie. Without preamble, she shoves her giant purse in Hux’s arms, piling her clipboard on top of it and the bluetooth that had been in her ear. “Keep an eye on these.”

“Yes ma’am,” Hux says with a nod. Over the past couple days, he feels he’s learned how to best to communicate with Leia whole-ass Organa. The best way being: never say more than you absolutely have to, and do exactly as you’re told.

“Sit in the back and keep an eye out for trouble. You see any stragglers or gawkers getting too close, I’m gonna need you to handle them.”

“Yes ma’am.”

“We have pictures straight after the ceremony, so I want you to be the first one out. As soon as it’s over, you haul ass to the reception and tie up any loose ends.”

“Yes ma’am.”

Leia smiles in bemusement, maybe even fondness, and reaches up to pat his cheek. “You’re an asshole, Hux. But you get shit done.”

“Thank you,” Hux replies with genuine sincerity. It might be the nicest thing anyone has ever said to him.

Leia shuffles up the aisle to her first-row seat. Han claps Hux on the shoulder as he follows. Despite the drama of the past few days, they’ve both been kinder and warmer toward him than either of his own parents. It’s a shame he’ll never see them again after this; he may have been growing to like them, their crass honesty and needless passive-aggression. Ben’s parents are like a breath of fresh air in a stale world—another time, another place, they may have been friends.

Hux has an entire row to himself in the back, and sets Leia’s effects on an empty chair beside him. He pulls out her cell phone—front inner pocket, tissues back inner pocket, Artie’s spare inhaler front pocket, billfold front and center, and he knows all of this because he has spent the better part of the past two days digging through this ancient leather dumpster virtually nonstop. He flips her phone to silent, but not before reading the most recent text message on her lock screen, from “Baby Benny”: _I don’t know ok? It’s too late anyway._ _I fucked up. He—_

The message cuts off after that. Hux stares at it, hesitant, and glances around. The wedding party hasn’t arrived yet, except for Finn waiting at the altar chatting happily with the little old woman who struck Hux with her cane. Hux slides his thumb across to unlock and is met with a passcode prompt. He blindly types in Ben’s birthday, 0525, which works, and Hux is taken to their conversation thread. He only catches the bottom handful—

**_9:13am_ **

_Leia: Come down here we need ur help_

_Ben: With what_

_Leia: Hanging shit up_

_Ben: Get a step stool_

_Leia: What r u doing_

_Ben: Watching tv with Chewie_

_Ben: Is Hux there?_

_Leia: Yes_

_Ben: Then I don’t feel like it_

_Ben: Sorry_

**_11:41am_ **

_Leia: Whats wrong w hut?_

_Leia: Hux_

_Ben: What do you mean_

_Leia: 4 yrs u have been telling me u hate him_

_Leia: Btw I changed my mind I like him_

_Ben: It’s a long story I’ll tell you later_

_Leia: I think u do like him_

_Ben: Yeah I did_

_Leia: Y didnt u tell me_

_Leia: U no I wouldnt have minded if he was ur actual date_

_Ben: I know_

_Ben: I just felt weird about it I’m sorry_

_Leia: But y put on this show if you truely did like him_

_Ben: I don’t know ok? It’s too late anyway. I fucked up. He’s never going to speak to me again_

—before the music strikes up. Hux flips the phone to silent and shoves it back in Leia’s bag.

***

Artie trudges down the aisle solemnly in his little blue and white suit, blond hair coiffed just so, but the steely glint in his eyes tells Hux he’s looking for a way to fuck this up somehow. As much as Hux relates to the effort, he meets Artie’s big blue eyes and gives him a stern glare, then slowly shakes his head. Artie’s eyes widen and he shoves his fat little hand in his basket, tossing the flower petals on the aisle haphazardly while walking down it at a brisk pace.

Yesterday Artie had managed to steal a pen straight out of Hux’s pocket, and before Hux even noticed, had broken it in half and spilled ink all of over himself. Parents nowhere to be found, Hux dragged him into the bathroom and washed him off as best he could. Every time Hux tried to ask why he would do such a thing, Artie would shout, “BLEEP BLOOP,” and cackle maniacally.

BeeBee comes next in a white dress with orange trim, her red hair up in pincurls. The moment she sees Hux, she gasps and says, “Hux!” but she has a lisp so it comes out _Huckth_.

Hux is acutely aware that everyone is staring at him. As BeeBee starts to veer off the aisle toward him, he leans over and whispers, pointing to Finn grinning at her from several feet away, “Do you see Uncle Finn? Go give your rings to him, okay?”

Shortly after the pen incident, Leia had plopped BeeBee in his arms while she was busy yelling at someone on the phone, so for several hours Hux had been given babysitting duty, which mostly involved Artie trying to escape the confines of the banquet hall and dragging BeeBee into trouble with him. It had been...stressful, to say the least.

BeeBee eventually stumbles on her chubby legs toward him, tiny pillow in hand with the rings tied to it. Finn says, “Thank you,” as he takes it from her, and she rushes away to find her mom, standing at the far side of the altar, pin curls bouncing the whole way.

Lando and Uncle Chewie come down the aisle next, dapper in tuxes. Lando gives Hux a wink as he passes. The three of them had lunch together earlier in the day, though it felt more like Hux was watching a show, Lando embellishing tall tales that Hux had already heard from Ben over the years, and Chewie periodically roaring with laughter.

Next up, Jessika leans heavily on Threepio, who is for some reason wearing a shining golden tuxedo. He walks slowly, an awkward kind of shuffle to make up for Jessika’s stumbling gait. Regardless, she gives Hux gun fingers as she passes.

Hux crosses his legs and stares straight ahead in preparation for the next couple. Only when Ben and Poe have passed does he risk a glance at them, in matching black tuxedos. Like the day before, neither of them acknowledge Hux, but he doesn’t care. And he doesn’t watch Ben stand solemnly at the altar, his hands folded in front of him, looking far more mature than he actually is.

The wedding march begins. Everyone strains back in their seats to look at Rey and Luke. She holds onto her father’s arm, grinning at the guests. Her ivory gown drapes over her body like water, the long train trailing out behind her. She grips a bouquet in her fist. Then her eyes meet Finn’s at the end of the aisle and her smile gets impossibly wider—they're just two young idiots in love, hanging out on the beach.

As she makes her way down the aisle, Hux remembers yesterday, Rey and Finn dancing together. He compares it to now, same place, same people. The only real difference is that the attire is nicer. Hux had always envisioned marriage to be a grandiose affair, but this feels...simple. Easy.

That’s what a wedding is supposed to be, Hux thinks: not the first day of something new, but a day to dress up and show people how much you already love each other. Just another day in a long, long line of them.

Rey kisses Luke’s cheek, passes her bouquet to Ben, and takes her place at the altar, holding Finn’s hands in hers. The minister begins speaking, secular epithets about companionship, the importance of family. Hux tries to tune it out but he can’t, not when he’s been handed both companionship and the family he’s always wanted, but has to give it up as soon as he gets back to the mainland. He has to face his empty apartment. His Human Resource inquisition. Severing ties with Ben.

He glances to the right of Rey, where Ben stands tall and proud and glaringly handsome while he watches the proceedings. Unlike his uninspired work suits, his tux fits him well, the sun has darkened his skin, and the slight breeze ruffles his hair. Hux catches the little tremble of Ben’s lip, the glassiness of his eyes, how they dart to Hux’s own. They meet each other’s gaze for the first time since last night. Hux swallows down the lump in his throat and tries to breathe, then has to averts his attention toward anything other than the horrible, lonely ending awaiting him.

Hux wipes his eyes and tunes out the remainder of the ceremony.

***

“Why couldn’t you get Jessika to do this?” Hux asks from under the massive train of Rey’s gown. The bridesmaids’ dressing room is empty except for the two of them. He pulls at ribbons that have been numbered with a ballpoint pen. He’s holding four in one hand, looking around the scratchy tulle for its partner. He never thought he’d live to see the day he finds himself under a woman’s skirt. His mother would be so proud.

“If you haven’t noticed, Jessika is still drunk.”

“But isn’t she a rocket scientist or something? Surely a drunken rocket scientist would do better at this hustle thing than a sober office supply salesman.”

“It’s called a _bustle_.” She swings her foot back and kicks Hux’s knee with her heel.

Hux retaliates by pinching her calf. She yelps. “Stand still, or I’ll connect ribbon nine with ribbon five and you’ll be walking around with a train that looks like a crumpled ball of paper.”

Rey lets out an indignant grunt and waits. Hux successfully ties the fours together, then begins digging through tulle for ribbon five. After he moves on to six, Rey says, in a somewhat begrudging tone, “You know, we all like you.” Hux pauses, holding ribbon six, but now he’s found a button for some reason too, and she adds, “Well we did. And then we didn’t. And now we do again, because Benny told us the whole story.”

“Oh?” Hux asks, failing miserably at coming across as blandly interested.

“He got drunk and confirmed what everyone was already suspicious of, that he actually has feelings for you but he fucked up, but maybe you don’t know him like we do to understand that he kind of fucks up everything and you just have to accept that about him.”

Hux sighs. “He tried to get me fired, Rey.”

“No, he tried to find you a better job instead of finding one himself because _somebody_ told him no one else would hire him.”

“Don’t put this on me,” Hux says, tying the sixes in a double-knot. “He could have been an adult about the situation and just _told_ me. We could have worked something out.”

“So you would have said yes, is what you’re saying?” Hux freezes, thankful he’s hidden under a massive train. When he doesn’t reply, Rey adds, “Don’t lie to me, Brendol. If Ben had been...slightly more tactful about asking you out, would you have given him a chance?”

Hux doesn’t know what to say. It seems ridiculous to have come this far just to admit to it now, of all places, under his ex-fake-boyfriend’s cousin’s dress.

He can hear the smug smile on her face as she realizes out loud, “Oh my god, you have feelings for him too!”

Hux yanks the train off of his head and glares at her in the reflection of the full length mirror in front of them. “Yes, alright? I have feelings for Ben. A lot of feelings. Too many feelings.” He immediately feels an immense, burdensome weight lifted from his shoulders. When he breathes, it’s similar to how he felt walking out of the Honolulu airport, the first breath of fresh tropical air.

She’s still grinning at him; it’s a much less frightening look than her disdain from days prior. “So what’s the problem? You like him, he likes you. That’s all there is to it.”

Hux finally figures out the button thing, and loops a piece of thread over it. “You make it sound simple.”

“That’s because it is.”

“We work together.”

“According to Ben, you were about to get fired anyway. And you have a hundred job offers just waiting for you.”

“Ben is mad at me.”

“He won’t be if you just talk to him.”

“Ben—”

“Stop it. No more excuses. This whole thing was your idea, you have more dating experience than Ben, and you’re both perfect for each other. Now shut up and go ask my cousin out.” She points to the door.

“You’re right,” Hux says, standing. The bustle is as good as it’s going to get. _Close Enough Award,_ Ben would say, as he does every time he accomplishes a task to its mediocre completion, really a metaphor for his entire life. “I have to fix this.”

Rey glances at her cell phone and types out a message. “But first you have to go to an ABC store and get Aunt Leia a phone charger. She says she can’t find hers.”

“It’s probably buried in the bottom of that trash compactor she calls a purse.”

Rey grins at him. “I dare you to tell her that.”

***

Roast pig. Check. Decorations. Check. All wedding party members accounted for. Check. Photographers. Check. DJ. Check. Open bar. Check and _thank god_. All guests happily seated. Check. Leia’s cell phone charging in a corner. Check.

Hux breathes a heavy sigh. It’s over. It’s finally over. He slumps onto a chair near the back at the kids' table where he’s been assigned, too tired to even order himself a drink. Artie and BeeBee are coloring in some coloring books, completely ignoring him.

At the front of the room, Ben sits at the wedding party table, already eating while the caterers make their way through the room. Hux watches him from afar, wanting to reach out, go over to him and talk this over, but...hesitant. Because of the wedding, obviously. If he did anything to ruin the reception, Leia would behead him. And that’s the only reason. Not because he’s terrified. Definitely not terrified.

He spends most of dinner trying to keep Artie from stealing BeeBee’s food—where _are_ their parents?—which becomes a moot point when Artie lunges for her plate while Hux isn’t looking.

Their squabble is interrupted with the sharp trill of a fork tapping against a champagne glass, and Hux looks up to see Ben standing and looking utterly mortified at having to address his entire extended family at once. From afar, his bruises are mostly unnoticeable, but it doesn’t matter because Hux is sure everyone in the room knows every possible iteration of how they came to be incurred.

“Um,” Ben begins, laughing nervously into a microphone. “It, uhh, it feels kinda stupid to pretend to be formal right now, considering half the people in this room probably changed my diaper at some point.”

“We don’t mind,” Lando says from the other end of the table. “You’ll get there eventually.”

Ben glares at him and everyone laughs. “Thanks, Uncle Lando. Anyway, um, I didn’t write this down, and I probably should have.” He looks at the table instead of the audience, shifting over a fork for no apparent reason. “But I just want to say, you know, Rey and Finn are two of my best friends. I can’t imagine my life without them. And I think, when we were growing up, it would have been easy for them to put their relationship into the friendship box and ignore it, to hide their feelings for each other, not wanting to risk ruining what they already had. And I remember—” He looks at Rey and Finn at the center of the table and gives them a half-smile. “—sorry guys, I can’t do a toast without an embarrassing story.”

Hux can see Rey mouth, _Don’t you dare_ , while Finn grins and nods in encouragement.

“I was out sick one day, when we were, I don’t know, fourteen or whatever, and I needed to borrow Rey’s math notes. But instead of asking, I just...took them.” He stares at Rey while he talks, half-laughing between his words. “And she had all these, like, hearts in the margins with bubble letters F and R.”

Rey buries her face in her hands and Finn pats her back consolingly.

“But me, being, you know, me, I didn’t get it,” Ben continues, “I was like, _Who the hell is FR?_ But I was suspicious, so I did an experiment. I waited a week, then while we were walking home, I said, ‘You have a crush on Poe, don’t you?’ She gave me a look which, in retrospect I should have read as, _He’s super gay, bro_ , but as we all know, I was the last person to find that out.” He clears his throat while people have a polite inside-joke chuckle, Poe letting out a bark of laughter from across the table. “So the next week, I said, ‘You totally have a crush on Finn.’” Ben finally looks at the audience. “And that. That’s when I knew. She went _nuts_. The entire walk home, it was, ‘Shut up, I do not.’ I didn’t say anything. Then, ‘I really don’t. You believe me right?’ And, ‘He’s my best friend, of course I don’t like him like that. I mean I _like_ him but I don’t _like him_ like him.’ The entire way home, I was completely silent and she just kept burying herself deeper.

“This story has a tragic ending, though, because less than a year later I caught them making out in my bedroom.” Everyone laughs again, and Ben picks up his champagne glass. “The point is, it’s never easy making the leap from friends to something more. It takes courage and patience, which most of us—” He glances at Hux. Their eyes meet again, Ben’s expression filled with remorse. His voice wavers slightly. “—which most of us don’t have.” He pauses for an agonizing moment, then forces a smile on his face. “But you two have it in spades, and because of that, your love will never falter.” He raises his glass and concludes, “To Rey and Finn.”

Hux catches Leia dabbing at her eyes with a tissue, Han reaching around her shoulders and pulling her close. Everyone claps, and when the applause settles, Poe takes a mic and stands. BeeBee is on his hip—Hux looks around wildly, wondering how she managed to sneak away from him—and says, “You know I can’t follow that up, Benny. So I’ll keep this short.” He looks at Rey and Finn. “Congrats, guys. I love you both. How about some music?”

***

Artie’s parents thank Hux on their way out—blessedly taking Artie with them—and to Hux’s bewilderment mention something about looking forward to seeing him at Thanksgiving. The traditional dances are all done, and Hux downs three vodka tonics to settle his nerves.

Ben is at his seat, playing on his phone. Most of the guests are dancing. Hux sets his empty glass on the bar and approaches Ben’s table, mustering as much courage as he can.

“Benjamin,” he says with a brusque nod.

Ben looks up at him, his face an innocent, sullen mask of confusion. “Hux.”

Hux has somehow never asked this question in his entire life: “I was wondering if maybe you would like to perhaps, possibly—”

Ben’s expression brightens, a barely held smile on his face while he takes joy in watching Hux struggle.

“—totally platonically, if you’d rather, or not, it’s up to you—dance with me?”

Ben leaves Hux hanging for a long, horrible handful of seconds. Finally, he says, “I can’t dance.”

“Well neither can I, but if Maz can manage it, I’m sure we can too.”

On the dance floor, Maz is dancing with both Lando and Chewie at the same time. She hasn’t sat down since the music began, cane all but forgotten at her table.

“Okay,” Ben relents.

Once they get to the dance floor, there’s a brief moment of _whose hands go where_ , but Hux sighs and wraps his arms around Ben’s neck. “Like you had any doubt.”

Ben places his hands on Hux’s hips, like a middle school dance, and Hux would hate this with his entire being were it not for the immense satisfaction he feels upon being able to touch Ben again. They sway to the slow music, lost in a sea of other couples, the music too loud to be conducive to conversation.

But Hux still can’t help himself when he says, “So. Courage and patience.”

“I googled wedding toasts,” Ben replies.

“No you didn’t.”

“Shut up.” After a pause he adds, “Did you mean what you said before? If I asked you out, you’d say no?”

“That depends.”

“On what?”

“Ask me and we’ll find out.”

“Hux,” Ben begins, then looks around surreptitiously and steps closer, squashing the holy spirit. He runs his hands under Hux’s jacket and settles them on his lower back, his body warm and enormous. His lips graze Hux’s ear as he says, “Would you like to go out sometime?”

Hux’s breath is stopped up in his chest. A shiver runs down his spine. His mind races to provide him with an ounce of snark, some sharp wit to dull the intensity of the moment, but all that comes out is: “I’d like that.”

Ben inches back, beaming at him. His victory grin then wavers and something darker takes over; his eyes flit to Hux’s lips. Their bodies are barely moving, mostly just holding on to each other in the middle of a dance floor. Hux parts his lips to say something, but before he can, Ben kisses him.

Hux associates happiness with waking up on Christmas morning as a child, lazing through hot summers, his daily lunch hour with Ben, but all of it pales in comparison to this, a kiss no longer wrapped in lies and petty games. A real one. Just because they want to.

Hux threads his fingers in Ben’s hair and nearly melts into his arms, swaying to the music and letting himself enjoy the raw honesty of it all, of his feelings for Ben, of Ben’s feelings for him.

And then he notices that the music has stopped. Followed by the distinct prickle on the back of his neck that he's being watched.

He pulls away from Ben and looks around. Every single wedding guest is staring at them.

From several feet away, Rey shouts, “Finally!” and everyone cheers.

“I hate your family,” Hux tells Ben.

“Trust me, I do too,” Ben replies.

***

The elevators aren’t even closed completely before Ben is on him again, pressing him against the mirrored wall and trailing kisses down his neck.

“Your mother’s going to kill me,” Hux says, strained, gripping the lapels of Ben’s suit in his fists.

“Doesn't matter,” Ben mutters against his throat.

“I told her I’d stay after and help clean up.”

“You’ve paid your dues, Hux. She won’t care.”

“Are we talking about the same woman? Because I’m fairly certain—”

Ben shuts him up by kissing him again, and whatever stupid thought had been nagging at Hux’s mind is replaced by total bliss.

The elevator slows to a halt several floors before their destination, and Ben forcibly pulls himself away from Hux, gripping the bar behind him and glaring at the long panel of buttons like they personally offended him. A young Japanese couple get on, smiling slightly before averting their attention from the obvious fucked-out appearance of their elevator cohorts.

Several arduous moments pass wherein Hux is concerned for the structural integrity of the hollow brass of the bar in Ben’s grip. His heart skips a beat in his chest, a blip of surreality of it all—being in Hawaii with Ben and his family, lips swollen from kisses, the slight sting on his nose and cheeks from the sun, well-earned exhaustion settling in his bones. And under all that, the most damning feeling of all: hope. When he gets home, he can face whatever is awaiting him at work, go on a date with Ben, email Leia the recipe he mentioned to her for artichoke dip, text Rey pictures of his cat.

Maybe it’s the vodka tonics, but suddenly the world doesn’t seem like such a lonely place anymore.

They get to their floor and Ben takes Hux’s hand, yanking him out of the elevator and pulling him down the hallway. He only lets go to thumb through his wallet, looking vainly for his keycard. Hux lets him struggle for a moment before handing his over, and when Ben shoves it in the lock, he shoulders the door so roughly that Hux worries for the doorjamb. He wonders how much it would cost if they had to replace it. Moreover, what the explanation would be. _You see, we were in a bit of a rush to touch dicks. So sorry._

The door finally opens and Ben drags Hux in by his tie, slams the door, and immediately shoves Hux against it.

“Eager much?” Hux asks.

“Shut up,” Ben growls, pushing Hux’s jacket off his shoulders and letting it pool to the floor. The tie comes next, but he gets fed up with shirt buttons and ends up kissing Hux again, deeper than before, less reserved than all the other times they’ve done it. Ben bites and sucks at Hux’s lip, and Hux lets out an involuntary moan, can feel Ben smiling against him. Ben trails his hands down Hux’s body and stops at his thighs, lifting slightly so Hux can wrap his legs around Ben’s waist.

As often as Ben uses his physical strength to manhandle Hux against his will, this moment is the benefit of it that Hux has been daydreaming about for years. Hux can feel Ben’s erection strain against his own, still trapped by too many layers of formal attire.

“Bed,” Hux urges, so Ben pulls him from the door and carries him to the bed, dropping him on the mattress. They make quick work of stripping out of the rest of their clothes, and Hux only gets a solid second of looking at Ben’s adonis-like naked form before he’s sliding between Hux’s legs. He kisses down Hux’s hip and licks a stripe up the length of his cock.

Hux tangles his hands in Ben’s hair, biting back a loud moan. Ben sucks him down in his big, hot mouth, which is, typically, always spewing the stupidest things and distracting Hux with his pretty lips and shy smile and— _oh god_ , he’s close already, this shouldn’t even be possible.

He scratches at Ben’s shoulders and urges him upward. Ben takes the hint and trails kisses up Hux’s body, landing once more on his lips and _fuck_ , Hux is going to look just as bruised as Ben tomorrow. The flight attendants will think horrible things about them.

They slide slick and easy against each other. Hux takes them both in hand and Ben covers it with his own. They find a rhythm and within moments, Ben is panting against Hux’s throat, his hips shifting in little shallow thrusts that are driving Hux to prayer.

Ben’s massive form tenses above him. “Oh fuck,” he groans as he comes over their fists and Hux’s stomach. Hux follows with a sharp inhale, coming hard between them, stroking them both through it. He’s never felt such intense relief in his life—physically, emotionally, existentially. Just...total relief.

Ben slumps beside him, breathless, groping blindly for his boxers. When he locates them, he mops them both up and then pulls Hux into his gangly, overbearing embrace. Hux grumbles in dissent, sleepy, already getting accustomed to Ben’s constant manhandling of him.

“Don’t get used to this,” Hux mutters.

“Yeah, okay,” Ben says, muffled against Hux’s shoulder, and squeezes him tighter.

***

“Are you aware why we called this meeting?” Phasma asks, looking unnecessarily intimidating in a blazer whose shoulder pads would probably fit better in a football uniform.

“No clue, actually,” Hux replies. Not one but _two_ representatives from Human Resources sit on either side of Phasma, padfolios filled with manilla folders that Hux gathers involve some exit paperwork. A folded filing box leans against a corner of the room.

Despite this, Hux feels light, giddy. Ben is waiting for him on the other side of the door, prepared to help Hux clean out his desk and take a half-day to console him. And by “console” his exact words were: _fuck you until you can’t remember your own name._

During their layover in San Francisco, Hux began calling a few of the recruiters back. He has four interviews scheduled next week, all of which seem fairly promising. None of the positions would be an upward movement, but none of them seem particularly worse than the job he has now. Which really tells him what Ben thinks of his work ethic.

What’s terrifying, though, is that Phasma doesn’t have the victorious glow Hux had been expecting, the smug smile of a termination well earned. Instead she scowls and slides over a piece of paper. “We’d like to offer you the position of Sales Leader in Print Communications.”

Hux reads the paper, a business letter outlining the position and the offer for a significant pay increase. He glances up at Phasma and asks, perhaps inappropriately given his current priorities, “So just Print. A completely different department. Nowhere near Supply?” Nowhere near Ben, he means. 

She shakes her head, offering the barest ounce of satisfaction, still buried deep underneath the resentful rubble of one of her spineless minions promoted to her level. “Other side of the building. Your office has a beautiful view of a brick wall and some dumpsters.”

One of the HR reps—a smarmy young man named Mitaka—cuts in. “We’re aware you’re shopping around elsewhere, so we wanted to extend this offer to you in hopes to keep you with the company. We can’t risk losing good talent, and we hope you consider staying with us.”

Phasma looks at the boy like she’s two seconds from striking him down.

“I—” Hux begins, ready to blindly accept so he can go tell Ben and maybe get a congratulatory lunch-hour fuck. Then he pauses, and for some ridiculous reason Leia Organa’s obnoxiously commanding presence metaphorically slaps him upside the head, reminding him to negotiate. “—have some current offers on the table that I’m hoping you’ll be willing to match.”

***

Hux lets Ben believe he got fired for an entire hour. He gives Ben a sad look and they walk in silence together to their cube, the flattened box under Hux’s arm. They pack up Hux’s things, and Ben asks, gesturing to the full box, “Do you want me to take it to your car?”

Hux shrugs and locks his overhead cabinet. “No, you can just drop it off at my new office.”

“What?”

“Print. It’s on the other side of the building.”

Ben pauses, and asks again, “What?” When Hux can’t hide his stupid smile anymore, Ben pieces it together. “You are such an _asshole_.”

“Corner office. There should be a name plaque. Brendol Hux, Sales Leader.”

“Of fucking course you’d get promoted. I can’t fucking believe it.”

“That’s inappropriate language, underling. I won’t stand for such unprofessionalism in my workplace.”

“Fuck you.”

“I’d like that.”

Ben goes bright red.

The rest of the day passes in a haze of working through the transition. By the time five rolls around, Ben meets Hux at his new office and they walk together to their cars, like they’ve done nearly every day for five years. Ben even remote starts his damn Bimmer like always. The only difference is that today Ben asks, “You want to grab dinner or something?”

“Where?” Hux asks, leaning against Ben’s car.

“Doesn’t matter to me.”

“The Chinese place?”

“You’ve got to be kidding me.”

“What?”

“It closed, remember?”

Hux shakes his head. “Doesn’t ring a bell.”

Ben sighs and opens his car door, but before he slides in, he stops and says, “Oh, almost forgot. Mom wanted me to invite you to Artie’s birthday next weekend.”

“I know,” Hux replies. “She emailed me this morning. And Rey wants us to come over to help her write thank you notes next week. And Han asked me if I’d be willing to help him sneak onto a golf course sometime. And BeeBee’s parents want me to babysit because they claim she won’t stop talking about me.”

Ben stares at him, dumbfounded. “God, you’re one of them now. I take it all back. We can’t do this—”

Hux shuts him up with a kiss, and Ben, having never taken anything lightly in his life, presses Hux against the car and deepens it until it goes from innocent to totally depraved. Hux thinks there might be more to the gesture, gratitude or something else Ben can’t express with words, unexpected comfort that Hux accepts Ben’s ridiculous family as much as his family welcomes Hux. All the pieces of Ben’s seemingly shattered identity can come together now, no fraction of him needing to be hidden from the others, and Hux loves the whole lot of it, the entire picture, everything Ben is. Hux, too, revels in not having to lie anymore, to himself or anyone else. He doesn’t have to sit through lonely evenings or wake up to an empty bed.

When Ben pulls away, Hux says, “Of course we can, _darling_.”

“If you insist,” Ben replies with a put-upon sigh despite the smile threatening his lips, “ _sweetheart_.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You can reblog the post [here](http://kylomend.tumblr.com/post/143331255263/so-while-hux-is-listening-to-an-utterly-rambling) and listen to the mix by brawls [here](http://8tracks.com/brawlite/something-about-volcanoes).
> 
> Rotating guest betas include: [ship](http://www.shiphitsthefan.tumblr.com), [brawls](http://www.brawlite.tumblr.com), [lingua](http://www.lingua-mortua.tumblr.com), [b&e](http://www.bert-and-ernie-are-gay.tumblr.com), and [heather](http://www.experimintal.tumblr.com).


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